


All the Lies We Believe

by Maltheniel



Series: The Once and Future King [14]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: F/M, and the future she changed, and the man she loves, around Freya recovering from the lies her hard life has led her to believe, chapters are organized thematically, in which we get Freya's perspective on the years she spent in the lake, the knights she harbored
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:27:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 43,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25629700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maltheniel/pseuds/Maltheniel
Summary: "This is the lake of Avalon," Freya told Lancelot, "and this is your second chance."Or, in which the shy, cursed druid girl who believes herself to be a monster is destined to become the Lady of the Lake, to stand by Merlin and change the future. This is the story of how she brings wholeness back to Camelot and finds her own happiness along the way.
Relationships: Freya/Merlin (Merlin)
Series: The Once and Future King [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1774627
Comments: 36
Kudos: 53





	1. Powerless

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [A Practical Man](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8202974) by [Drag0nst0rm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/pseuds/Drag0nst0rm). 



When Freya was a girl, she lived on the borders of a lake, with mountains rising majestically and wildflowers everywhere, and milk cows in the fields. She had parents who loved her, an older brother and a baby sister, and never saw anyone else except the strange druids who occasionally dropped by. If she was lonely, she never thought about it for more than a few minutes. There were mountains to climb and wilds to explore, berries to pick and fields to wander in, and she and her brother Edwin would explore it all side by side. There were chores to be done on the farm and work to be done around the house, and she was a part of it all. Everyone in her family had druids' tattoos and gold flickered in and out of their eyes, and as far as Freya knew that was normal and safe and beautiful.

There came a day, however, when she and Edwin were scrambling down the side of a mountain in high summer, their lips and fingers stained red with berries, clothes and legs scratched from scrambling through the bracken, laughing together. Mother shook her head at them when they came back from expeditions like this nowadays and said they were both growing up and would need to learn what that actually looked like someday, but she said it with a smile, and Edwin and Freya were both carefree and young this particular afternoon.

They reached the ridge from which they could see their farm and paused to look down, as they always did. All Freya saw was the curl of smoke rising from the farmhouse before Edwin grabbed her arm and yanked her behind the crest of the ridge.

"Edwin!" Freya protested indignantly. He had nearly pulled her clean off her feet, and she would have gone on protesting, but he clapped one hand over his mouth. He had gone very white, and she had to look away from his eyes.

"Freya," he whispered, "the knights have found our home."

Freya felt the blood drain from her own face. As far back as she could remember, the knights had been the one thing she feared because everyone in her family feared it. But it had always been a nebulous, distant dread, as of something that would never happen.

"We have to help them," she whispered as soon as Edwin took his hand off her mouth. The thought of her father and mother and her helpless little sister who was even more hopeless at combative magic than Freya was herself down with the knights overwhelmed her.

"I have to help them," Edwin retorted, wrapping his hands around her upper arms. "You need to stay up here, Freya."

"Edwin!" Freya snapped.

"You can't use magic combatively," Edwin reminded her. "You can't even snap a twig with it. That's not a bad thing," he added hastily, because Freya was ashamed of this particular shortcoming and would have protested his bringing it up indignantly. "But if I take you down there with me now, you'll die. I can't take you down to die."

"You can't die either, Edwin!" Freya protested, her voice catching a bit. "None of you can."

"I'll do my best," Edwin promised. He suddenly tugged her into his arms and hugged her tightly. Freya clung to him with all the strength she had and didn't know how she'd ever let go.

The rest of that day, after Edwin left her safely on the back of the ridge and went down to try to help, was a complete blur to Freya.

She did remember kneeling in the ashes of what had once been her home, swept with fire and utterly unrecognizable now, sobbing uncontrollably in the light of a pale, uncaring moon.

She remembered leaving four graves, marked with small wooden crosses, behind her when she left.

Freya remembered feeling completely and utterly powerless.

"So you're the wretched creature who robbed me of my son."

Freya's breath was hitching every time she drew it in, in spite of her determination not to show fear. She was trapped in a tightly woven network of vines the sorceress had called out of the ground and wrapped around her.

The one time Freya had been able to call on combative magic – the one time she had desperately needed to call on it – it had left her a murderess in the hands of an enraged sorceress, so much more powerful than Freya was that Freya doubted she would have been able to get away even if she could have fought.

The sorceress stalked around Freya in a circle. She had obviously been beautiful once, but the years had left her hardened, her face lined with resentment and anger, and now furious with the grief of loss.

Freya understood that grief all too well.

"I'm sorry," she gasped out, willing her voice not to shake and nearly succeeding. "I didn't want to kill him, but he gave me no choice."

"No choice, is it?" the sorceress hissed. She stopped in front of Freya, drew herself to her full height, and let out a wild laugh. "No choice! I'll show you what it is to have no choice, little monster."

She drew her arms back, then flung her hands at Freya, and hissed out a long string of words that Freya had no chance of catching. Her eyes turned brilliant gold, and Freya felt as though she had been run through with a dozen spears. She gasped for breath and would have collapsed to her knees were it not for the vines holding her up.

"Wh-what have you done to me?" she demanded, the moment she had breath to speak at all.

The sorceress had collapsed to her own knees in the fading light of evening, a truly twisted smile turning her features cruel in the shadowed light.

"You wanted to kill so badly that you took my son from me," she said. "I've condemned you to kill forever. You claim you had no choice. Now you truly have none."

Freya's eyes went wide; this was the last, the absolute last thing she would ever have wanted. "You – you can't!" she cried. "I never wanted to kill – _never!_ Please, please, don't –"

But even as she tried to form the words, the sunlight was leaking away, and Freya felt something moving under her skin, rippling as if it tried to shift into another form.

The sorceress, laughing mirthlessly under her breath, waved a hand at the vines, and they vanished into the ground.

"Do you think I care what you wanted to do?" she asked. "Foolish girl, I have made you a Bastet."

Freya fell to her hands and knees, crying out with pain as everything in her shifted and rearranged. Out of the dark corners of her mind where she threw them came hissing every doubt, every fear she had ever had.

_They killed everyone you loved . . . they took everyone you had away from you . . . they made you afraid of the worst possible things happening to you . . . no one cares . . . you are an insignificant little druid girl . . . worthy of death . . . murderess . . . monster . . . kill . . . kill them all . . ._

There was only one person in the clearing that the Bastet could kill.

Freya came back to herself miles away, in a different part of the forest, with only vague impressions of what had happened during the night. She curled up and wept uncontrollably.

Whatever the sorceress had done to her, Freya had not wanted her dead. But once again, she had had absolutely no control.

Through all the haze, the memory of the sorceress's face in her last moments came swimming back. She had looked relieved, at peace.

Freya pulled herself into a tighter ball and sobbed. How long? How long until life grew so weary that she, too, could imagine no peace outside death? How long until this strange curse that condemned her to kill wore away at her desire to live?

Freya lay there until she stopped shaking and found enough self-control to force herself to her feet.

"Whatever comes, I will not take my life," she said steadily, to the silence of the woods around her. "They will have to take it from me. That, at least, I can and will control."

Perhaps that was the only thing she would ever have power over, but at least it was one thing.

Curled in the depths of the musty straw in a cage, headed toward her death, Freya remembered her promise that she would never take her own life and wished rather bitterly that she had taken it already.

Anything would be better than being dragged, ragged and in chains, before the man who commanded the knights who had slain her family. Anything would be better than dying at that king's hands, for he would have no mercy. She was simply a bounty to the wretched, cruel bounty hunter driving the cart and another faceless death to his ruthless king.

Tearless, Freya curled up against the bars of the cage and wished she could turn into a Bastet at will, so she could tear Halig and the king to pieces. Then at least she wouldn't be powerless.

It was a dark and rainy night when they reached Camelot. Freya huddled in the corner of the cage and wished for the thousandth time that she could control what nights the Bastet appeared and what nights it didn't. The not knowing was sometimes the worst part of it all.

The bounty hunter parked his cage in front of the inn. He checked the locks, leered through the bars at her, and swaggered off, leaving Freya chained in the cold, driving rain. Freya huddled down in a little heap, shivering, and wondered why she had expected things to be any different. No one saw her as human now, not the druids, not the townsfolk she crept among when she could no longer survive on her own, certainly not a bounty hunter.

Freya let her mind drift back to the lake, to the mountains, to her home unruined, to skipping with Edwin over the hills. If she was about to die, she wanted to die with all her most precious memories around her.

Footsteps by her cage startled her so much that she sat up abruptly, clinging to the bars of the cage for balance.

It was only an old man and a youth, barely older than she was herself.

"Gaius!" he exclaimed, startled.

The older man turned. "She's fallen prey to a bounty hunter," he said. Not cruelly, not triumphantly, simply matter-of-fact.

"She's only a girl," the youth protested, and Freya's torn heart throbbed. It had been so long, so very long, since someone had spoken about her with compassion.

"She'll still fetch a good price, though," Gaius replied, and Freya looked away.

"Someone's going to pay for her?" the youth exclaimed, sounding horrified. Freya wished she could still be that ignorant about the ways of Camelot; she had learned long, long ago that the tattoo she had once been so proud of was worth good money in Camelot.

"Uther offers a handsome reward for anyone with magic," Gaius answered, and turned to go.

The youth, however, turned back to look at her.

"There must be something we can do," he protested, and Freya looked back up at him. So long, again, since someone, anyone, had cared.

Gaius turned back. "Merlin," he said in a low voice, "bounty hunters are dangerous men. They're not to be meddled with. You of all people should understand that."

He was speaking low, clearly not intending to be understood by anyone else, but Freya caught his words. So Merlin had magic? and lived in Camelot? and hadn't gotten killed yet? Strange.

She expected them both to leave then, but Merlin turned and looked at her again, and Freya couldn't look away. She felt very small and weak and beaten, huddling chained and cold before him, but there was kindness and concern in his eyes, and she couldn't look away.

At least, when she died, there might be one person still in this world who wished she had lived.

The rain had stopped.

Freya was still cold. She lost herself in memories of the old days beside the lake and tried not to think about it.

She noticed Merlin out of the corner of her eye, but his presence barely registered until he suddenly stepped up to the side of the cage, put his hands over the bars, and said in a low, earnest voice, "Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you."

He wasn't the one she was worried about, Freya thought distantly.

Merlin hurried around to the back of the cage and hissed, _"Tospringe!"_ Instantly the door flew open.

Freya stiffened suddenly. He couldn't dare – it couldn't mean –

He leapt up into the cage with her, and in spite of his words Freya pulled back as much as her chains would let her. A man in her space had not been a good thing ever since Edwin died, and Freya couldn't shake away the memories – _cringing away, powerless, the magic she had never wanted to tap building up in her_ – in a moment.

Merlin knelt in front of her as she pulled away from him and reached out to touch her hands. His hand was warm against her cold fingers and very gentle. He met her eyes for a moment, his own direct and fearless, before he held his other hand over her chained wrists and whispered, _"Unspene thas maegth!"_

This time she saw the gold in his eyes. _Gold eyes that had made her a monster, gold eyes that had surrounded her as a child and held love in them –_

But he caught her hands as the manacles fell, and his touch was still gentle. So when he caught her hand and pulled her out of the cage after him, she went willingly.

Freya jumped down from the cage and felt one layer of powerlessness peel away from her.

Merlin caught her as she jumped down, a quick act of thoughtfulness that she hadn't expected. His hands resting briefly on her waist didn't make her want to cringe. The door of the tavern swung open, letting out a wave of laughter and hearty voices into the night, and Merlin spun her behind the wheel of a cart, pulling them both down into a crouch just as Halig came out.

Freya froze, clinging to Merlin's hand with all she had. She couldn't take going back into the cage – she _couldn't_ – not just now when she could taste a hint of freedom –

It took the bounty hunter a moment to notice that his bird had flown. Freya could tell the instant he understood, in the way he stopped short and whipped his favorite knife from his belt. He stepped up to the cart, catching at the loose chains in evident bewilderment.

Trying not to let her breath catch, Freya glanced sideways at Merlin. In all this abyss of fear, he was the only thing she could trust at the moment. He was staring at the bounty hunter intently, somehow not looking in the least afraid, but he must have felt her glance, for he tightened his grip around her cold fingers.

Halig was pacing around his cart. Freya glanced at Merlin again, feeling his heavy footfalls like blows and wishing Merlin could somehow take her miles away from here. Merlin rose slightly to look over the cart and whispered something Freya couldn't catch.

The next instant, the chain holding up the sign of the inn snapped, and the wooden sign slammed down on Halig's head.

Freya would have laughed hysterically in relief if she had had the chance.

The next instant, Merlin had scrambled to his feet beside her, and she leapt to her feet and followed him. He never let go of her hand as they darted through the streets. At first they nearly ran into guards and had to reverse their steps to duck into a side street, but after that Merlin never faltered as he led her, quick and unerring, through the citadel and into tunnels that must have led under the castle. He caught up a torch from the wall and told it _"byrne"_ with no hesitation.

Freya remembered the spell from her distant childhood as the torch burst into flames. In a distant, absent way, she wondered if she could still do it as Merlin led her deeper into the tunnels. After the one moment when he used both hands to light the torch, he still didn't let go of her hand, and Freya grounded herself by his touch.

At last they ducked around a corner into a small alcove, dirt-floored and safely small, and Merlin let go of her hand and took a step back. "They won't find you here," he said, breathless but firm.

Freya couldn't look at him. She wanted to say thank you, but she couldn't find the words. A small portion of her mind was still a million miles away, remembering the last time someone had held her hand, as she and Edwin scrambled down the mountainside, careless and young.

"Here," a strange voice said suddenly, and a man moved toward her.

Freya gasped and pulled back before she quite knew where she was, pulling up the torn shoulder of her red dress. A moment later she came back to herself and realized she was with Merlin, in a torch-lit tunnel underground, and he was holding out his jacket to her.

She expected him to, perhaps, throw it at her and storm off, or come closer again. But he backed away instead.

"Sorry," Merlin said quickly. "Sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you."

And he sounded sincere, too. Freya – Freya couldn't remember the last time someone had backed up when she had flinched.

"I just thought you might be cold," Merlin added, and it was true. Freya was cold. She couldn't help wrapping her arms tightly around herself.

But there were more important things. Such as why a complete stranger had cared for her, had openly risked his life to save her, when no one had cared a cent about her in years. What he might expect in return.

"Why did you do that?" she asked him, and wished her voice wasn't shaking.

"What?" Merlin asked, his shadowed face oddly gentle in the torchlight.

"Help me," Freya said.

"Well, I saw you, and –" Merlin began. He paused for a moment and looked away. Freya watched his face intently, waiting for the lie, waiting for the ulterior motive.

Merlin tilted his head a bit and met her eyes. "It could've been me," he said. "In that cage."

Freya felt her eyes widen, and looked away. _First time._ First time anyone had identified with her and decided to help her. And his face, his eyes, his voice were still so gentle. For the first time in years, Freya wondered if she could trust.

"You'll be safe down here," Merlin vowed again. "I'll come back in the morning with some food and candles." He hesitated, then asked with a bit of a smile, "Will you be alright till then?"

Freya made herself nod a bit. It was true, too. The Bastet clearly wasn't coming out tonight, and she'd slept in worse places with less of a promise for the morning before. And this little alcove in the tunnels with the hope of food in the morning was worlds better than the cold cage with the promise of death.

"I'm Merlin, by the way," he offered quietly.

Freya had actually remembered that from when the old man had used his name. But it was an offer of friendship, a door cracked ajar. And Freya was too desperate for the kindness he was offering not to nudge it open.

She couldn't help it – she trusted him.

"I'm Freya," she whispered without looking at him, and it had been so long since anyone had cared about her name that it sounded half-foreign on her lips.

"Freya," Merlin said – but oh, the way he said it! He said it as if it was one of the loveliest names he had ever heard.

She glanced up at him. He met her eyes and held out his jacket a little – a clear offering, giving her control of what she wanted to do.

And Freya did really want that jacket. He held it out, and she uncurled enough to take it from him. She wrapped herself in it at once. Ooh – it was warm, warm still with his body heat, and with a comforting smell of herbs and polish about it. Freya wrapped herself up deeply in it and felt better at once.

"I'll see you in the morning," Merlin told her, and somehow that was a wonderfully comforting promise. She'd never thought she'd meet a man she wanted to see again. "Freya," he added gently, and she thought she would never get tired of hearing him say her name.

He turned to go – stepped beyond the wall – before Freya could finally get her tongue to work. "Thank you," she called after him.

For rescuing her. For giving her the jacket. For saying her name that way. For being kind, so, so kind.

Merlin ducked back around the wall. He didn't say a word, just gave her a sweetly boyish smile and a quick nod.

And Freya thought in that moment, curled up tight in his coat, that maybe it wouldn't be such a horrible thing to trust the man who had given her a bit of control back, if only for now.

On the shores of the lake where she had spent her childhood, as drenched as the day she met Merlin but far warmer within, Freya slipped away, content and exhausted.

Merlin had carried her out of Camelot through the quiet rain, his arms strong and gentle around her. Freya rested her head on his shoulder and drifted away from the pain, to the home she had once had and to the last few days with Merlin.

When Merlin crouched down and lowered her into his arms, she opened her eyes.

Merlin was looking away over the landscape, and Freya followed his gaze.

The lake. _Her_ lake. Mountains.

She was home.

"You remembered," she whispered. This was the loveliest thing anyone had ever done for her.

"Of course," Merlin said quickly, because of course it was unthinkable that he would do any less. "I'm so sorry for what that sorcerer did to you," he added, and she could tell he was trying not to cry.

"Merlin," Freya breathed, "you have nothing to be sorry for." Of all the people she had ever known, that was truest of him.

He was barely listening. "There must be something I can do," he protested, "some way to save you."

"You already saved me," Freya told him, willing him to listen and understand. "You made me feel loved."

It was worlds different, dying like this in his arms, knowing he cared, than it would have been being executed for the king's pleasure. Her only regret was that she was leaving Merlin behind. He was crying, and there was nothing she could do about it.

"I don't want you to go," he whispered, and Freya wished she could stay, if only for him. She wished she could comfort him.

"One day, Merlin, I will repay you," she told him, and though she had no idea where the words had come from she knew with one of the rare moments of foresight she had that it was absolutely true. "I promise."

She held his eyes for as long as she could, clinging to the heartbroken love there. "Freya," he whispered, and she still loved how he said her name, and wished she could tell him. But the world was growing dark and drifting away.

She believed in that moment that she was going to see her family, that she would finally go home, and she was alright with going this way. She had been loved for the first time since her family died, and that was worth worlds.

But whatever she had expected, it most definitely wasn't what happened.

There was a space of utter blackness that Freya never remembered anything from, and then she began slowly coming back to herself.

She was lying on something relatively soft, still wrapped in the gentle folds of the royal dress Merlin had helped her into – she could tell by the feel of the cloth. The wound was gone, and so was the pain. So much she could tell without opening her eyes.

What was spectacularly strange, however, was the sensation that her consciousness was spread throughout a large lake. She could sense, without being there, the waves lapping on the shores, the water chasing itself through endless chasms of rocks, a small amount of her water in a vial somewhere far else in the hand of an extremely elderly man ready to let go, a whole underwater world – all around her.

Freya gasped and sat up quickly. She was underwater indeed, and had been lying on the floor of a lake. Somehow, somehow she wasn't drowning, nor did she even feel wet. Far above her the sun glinted down in shining shafts from the surface of the lake.

This – this was too much. Freya scrambled to her feet and skittered backward until her back was against the rock rising from the bottom of the lake; she braced herself against it, gasping.

Was this what death was? Existence underneath a _lake?_

"Calm yourself," a curious, rasping voice ordered quite near her.

That was the opposite of the way to get her to calm down – Freya hadn't seen anyone near her.

"Who are you?" she demanded wildly. "Where am I? What _happened?"_

"I'm right in front of you," the voice retorted obnoxiously. "I'm making myself as obvious as I can, you puny creature. Can't you see me? I'm literally zipping back and forth."

Freya finally managed to see a tiny blue streak of light whirling wildly around in front of her. "Alright," she said breathlessly, "I see you."

"Finally," the creature complained. It came to a halt, and then Freya could see it was a tiny glowing blue man with extremely pointed ears. "Now, let's get down to business. I suppose you have no idea where you are?"

"Not in the least," Freya said quickly, desperate for answers.

"Typical for a human," the little thing grumbled, half to itself. "This is the lake of Avalon, home of the Sidhe. I am, of course, the Elder of the Sidhe."

"Is this where everyone goes when they die?" Freya demanded.

"Of course not," the Sidhe scoffed. "Why would we choke our lake with useless humans? No, you were brought here because you made a promise, and that may prove very useful."

"You mean to Merlin?" Freya faltered.

_One day, Merlin, I will repay you. I promise._

Freya had no idea why she had said those words, except that in that moment as she was dying she had known them to be absolutely true.

"Finally she catches on!" the Sidhe exclaimed. "Now listen. There's going to be a lot that someone in Avalon has to do related to Merlin and that ridiculous Once and Future King, Arthur. We have far too much to do to bother with that, of course, so we decided it would be best if we had a Lady of the Lake to manage all of it for us. And of course when you made your promise with your magic to Merlin with his magic in the presence of the Lake with our magic, why, we saw an opportunity and took it."

"What am I meant to do?" Freya asked numbly. She wasn't at all sure she wanted to be at the beck and call of the Sidhe, but she doubted she had much of a choice.

"Well, to begin with, that fool Merlin tossed the most powerful sword in the Five Kingdoms into the lake a while ago," the Sidhe told her. "Why he thought that was a good place to keep it, I'm sure we'll never know, but he'll need it again at some point, of course. So it will be your duty to fish it out of the rocks and hand it up to him whenever he comes for it. I presume that vial of water the Fisher King stole from us will have significance at some point; you can deal with that. And most of all, it is prophesied that King Arthur will rest here between his Once, which is now, and his Future, whenever that is. We definitely can't be bothered with that, so you can receive him whenever he comes and send him back when his time arrives. Do you understand?"

Freya was, in fact, feeling rather overwhelmed. "And what happens to me?" she asked.

"You hang around until Arthur's Future comes, and then you're free to go on," the Sidhe answered snappishly. "Now I've got other things to do than talk to a useless human all day, even if you're not quite human anymore and a lot more useful."

"Will you be around?" Freya asked, thinking she could definitely use some direction in all of this.

"I very much doubt it," the Sidhe retorted. "We have our own space, quite different from what is now yours. Good luck, Lady of the Lake!" And with that he shot off and vanished.

Freya sank down in a little heap and buried her face in her arms. This was certainly not what she had thought death would be.

On the other hand, if she really could repay Merlin for his kindness this way, that would be worth something.

Over the next few days, Freya got used to the strangeness of being a lake and a girl at the same time, albeit a girl who didn't need to eat or sleep. She also realized that she was most definitely tied to Merlin, to the lake, and to Arthur with long threads of invisible magic, which she could sense now.

The Once and Future King was apparently the man who had killed her, just when in some ways she really wanted to live.

Freya – had a lot of conflicted thoughts about that. No matter. Hopefully it would be years before he would come to her and she'd have to deal with him.

She also realized that the underside of the surface of the lake could become her mirror to the world, showing her the world outside the lake.

It could flash everywhere at random, or she could direct it to show Merlin. Since she was tied to him by her promise and by magic, it wasn't hard to make the lake show her wherever he was.

She could probably have used her tie to Arthur to make it show her where he was, too. Freya didn't really care to do that. He showed up often enough when she was watching Merlin anyway.

The images came and went, and Freya couldn't keep them there all the time. Just often enough to have a very good sense of what was going on.

After a while, Freya adjusted to the fact that this was her life. It wasn't a bad one; she was safe at long last, and for the first time in years she didn't have to always be looking over her shoulder. She was very alone, except for the images on the surface of the lake, but that wasn't such a bad thing, especially since she could always watch Merlin.

And maybe, just maybe, she realized over time, she wasn't just a pawn of the Sidhe. Maybe she had a bit of control of the future too.

The first time Freya realized that she could do more than bring Arthur back was when Lancelot stepped through the veil.

Freya sincerely wished his death hadn't had to happen; out of all Arthur's knights, he most embodied chivalry, truth and honor, freedom and courtesy. She had liked the knight and thought he was a good friend to Merlin, and the moment he turned at the veil to smile at Merlin, accepting his death, Freya would have given anything to change what was about to happen.

The moment the veil snapped shut, though, something more snapped. There were threads, threads of magic and destiny, and Freya could suddenly sense them. She reached out, trying to find everyone they connected, and realized with a quick shock that it was everyone who had been present at the Round Table in the castle of the ancient kings. Merlin, Arthur, Gwen, Gaius, Leon, Gwaine, Percival, Elyan, and the loose, frayed ends reaching out where the veil had cut Lancelot off. And she was tied in because she was bound to Merlin and Arthur by magic.

A sudden, swelling determination flooded through Freya. She knew she was destined to receive Arthur after death and return him to life, and that was all she was meant to do. But Merlin had long since abandoned doing just what he was meant to do, and Freya felt like following in his footsteps. There would probably be more deaths before Arthur's, and if by any chance Freya could reach their souls cut adrift, she could collect them and bring them back to life too.

She wished she had realized this before Lancelot walked through the veil, because then, dangerous though it might have been, she would have tried to pull the bonds of magic tight and bring his soul to her.

It was once Freya had realized that she could probably mess with the futures of all those at the Round Table, not just Arthur, that she realized she should probably take a good hard look at what she was actually meant to do for Arthur.

Freya reached out to find the magic that connected Arthur to her. It wasn't hard to find the strands, and she flopped on her back on a rock, closed her eyes, and let herself explore them.

As Lady of the Lake, she was meant to bring Arthur to Avalon and send him back in the Future when he would be needed the most. She sensed that this was meant to be at some nebulous point long, long, long in the future.

By this time Freya had begun to figure out that being the Lady of the Lake had honed her ability to foresee things, and she did everything in her power to see down the long strands of magic and time to make out that future.

Most of what she could see was darkness. Arthur coming back, lost, bewildered, and with little idea how to deal with the darkness filling the world. Merlin the only familiar face from his own time, Merlin immortal through all the years struggling with the weight of his failure, Merlin a bit broken by the time Arthur came back and struggling to know how to guide him while also dealing with the enormous Arthur-shaped hole in his life being filled in a weird way that didn't heal all the jagged wounds.

Freya pulled herself back from seeing any more with a sharp jerk and sat up, eyes flying open.

_No._

She was not going to let that happen. She was not going to sentence Merlin to long years of aching loneliness, Arthur to a future he was meant to solve with no idea how. She, Freya, little druid girl, monster, Lady of the Lake, was the one who had the control. There was enough leeway in what she was meant to do that she could change the future.

And she _would._

For Merlin's sake, maybe even a little bit for Arthur's.

Freya steeled herself, lay back down, and started sorting out all the threads of magic connected to her and what she could do with them.

It would take a time of great peril to send Arthur back; she couldn't just go sending him back willy-nilly the moment he died, much as she would like to. She saw darkness creeping in, some of the knights falling – she couldn't tell which ones – and Merlin kneeling again and again on her shores, weeping silently.

But there was peril in the future – she couldn't tell when, but it wasn't the future thousands of years away. It was a near future, where Gwen ruled Camelot with a just hand and a heart temporarily repaired over old heartbreak, and there was – her child? – running around Camelot as well. It was a future where there was enough peril that she could justify sending Arthur back. Freya pulled the threads to her and tangled up all the threads from everyone at the Round Table with that peril as tightly as she could. For beyond the blackness of that peril, she could see light, brightness and healing and _hope,_ if she could only send everyone back. And that was worth anything to bring to pass.

If whatever magic had made Arthur the Once and Future King wanted him to come again for a second Future at that distant dark point, they could. But Freya was in control of his first Future, and she would be bringing him and all the others back at the nearer point in the future.

Freya, druid girl, monster, Lady of the Lake, Merlin's beloved, had spoken, and it would be.

She realized later that at the Round Table, when everyone had sworn loyalty to Arthur and he had accepted it gratefully, he had shared a little of the magic wrapped around his soul with them. Arthur had been tied up with magic ever since he was born of it, and it was the magic wrapped up in his life that gave him the power to be the Once and Future King. At the Round Table, he had opened his soul in warm gratitude to those who had sworn their lives to him, and the magic wrapped around him had reached out and bound them all together. It probably hadn't hurt that they were doing it around the table of kings who had had sorcerers at their right hands, or that the most powerful warlock to live was standing by Arthur's side.

Whatever the cause, it meant Freya had the power to add to her inclination to meddle in multiple destinies, and that was enough to make her smile.

She knew that some who had been at the Round Table would die before their time, before the time they were meant to pass away. And she realized one day, chasing down the threads of magic, that she could bring them back for the rest of their natural lives. They would be invulnerable until the day they were meant to die, deathless as Merlin himself seemed to be.

She still regretted she hadn't thought to sort all this out before Lancelot was severed from the rest.

There came a day when Freya felt a tugging at the loose threads of magic Lancelot's passing through the veil had left, and horrified and delighted all at once, Freya swung her vision of the land of the living away from Camelot to see what was going on.

She had _not_ wanted to find Morgana interfering.

Lancelot was scarcely alive, just a shade in Morgana's hands, but there was enough left of him that the threads of magic had snapped tight around him again, and Freya nearly danced with glee. She was pretty sure she could bring Lancelot back with the rest now.

When Merlin brought Lancelot's body to rest at Avalon, Freya's heart leapt; it would be so much easier here. She reached out quickly – and yes, there was still life here, a tiny sliver of it fighting to reclaim Lancelot's body, stuffed down and driven away by Morgana, tormented by all she had made him do, but still noble all the same. Freya fed all the magic she could through the boat up into him and felt her throat catch in relief when it was enough for him to meet Merlin's eyes one last time, enough for Merlin's spell to work so he could break free.

Then Merlin was pushing the boat out for burial, and Freya would have given anything to keep Avalon from being so full of death for Merlin, to keep him from having to say goodbye to a second person on its banks. She pushed all her love and tenderness out toward him, praying it was enough for a bit of it to slip past the waters to him. But the majority of her concentration was wrapped up in Lancelot; as his spirit fluttered free, leaving for its last journey, she reached out through the cords of magic and _pulled._

And it worked – his soul came down toward her. As it slipped through the surface of the lake, it was suddenly re-embodied, and the next moment Lancelot stood on the bottom of the lake, much as he had been in life, blinking at her in confusion.

"I beg pardon, my lady," he said, "but where am I?"

It was terribly impolite, but all Freya could do in the moment was laugh. Because she had done it. She, the weak little Druid girl, unable to use combative magic, who had been forced into becoming a Bastet and a curse, had changed the paths of history. She had extended the grace given Arthur, and someday not only he but Lancelot would be restored to life and given a second chance. Merlin would weep over Lancelot no more.

"This is the lake of Avalon," she told him, "and this is your second chance."

Freya was waiting up, reading in bed by candlelight, when Merlin came in. Reading had been one thing she couldn't do in the lake – there were no books underwater – and she'd known how to read since her parents taught her as a little child. Reading was one way of grounding herself in the present, of knowing that she was actually back in Camelot and all her wildest dreams were coming true around her.

But even if her wildest dreams were coming true, that didn't mean her life was without its difficulties.

For instance, Merlin coming back to their chambers far too late after they should have been in bed, looking tired and worn.

Freya was used to seeing Merlin looking tired and worn. She'd seen him like that far too often on the surface of the lake, powerless to do anything about it.

She wasn't powerless now.

"Merlin," she said quietly, uncurling herself from the covers.

"Freya," he said, in that way only he had of saying her name that she would never tire of hearing. He smiled as he turned to face her, and looked as if decades had fallen off his shoulders. "You didn't have to wait up for me."

"But of course I did," Freya protested. She came up to him and framed his face very gently with her hands. "Love," she said, "you're taking too much on yourself."

Merlin wrapped his arms around her. "It's not usually like this, dear," he said. "I just took off a lot of time recently, what with Arthur's trip into the woods and the week we had after our wedding. And I don't regret any of that," he reassured her quickly, bending to give her a quick kiss on the forehead, "but it has put me very behind."

Freya took a moment, and just a moment, to let herself enjoy being held by Merlin. He was still the only man who could hold her like this, and she would relax into it. That was, she thought, as it should be.

"Merlin," she said quietly, "I love you, but don't you dare say that it's not usually like this. I watched you run yourself ragged for years for Arthur and then for Gwen. I know too much about you to believe this isn't all too common."

Merlin laughed, just a little, not a particularly happy laugh, and rested his forehead against her hair. "What am I meant to do differently, my love?" he asked. "There are duties I have and will always have. I promise I won't always be so late coming up to our chambers; I _am_ behind just now."

"I know you are," Freya admitted. She broke gently out of his grip, took his hands, and pulled him to the bed so they could sit facing each other. He didn't let go of her hands, and Freya was glad; she would have taken them again if he'd tried to pull them away.

"What are all these important jobs that only you can do?" she asked. She brushed up against his mind in the new way they were only just starting to experiment with letting each other do, nudging all her worry and concern toward him and letting him know that the emphasis was on why only he could do them, not what his duties were.

Merlin drew in and let out a long breath. "There's being Court Sorcerer," he said.

"I'd never ask you to give that up," Freya interrupted him quickly. That was what he was meant to do, what he had always been meant to do – to stand by Arthur and Gwen and bring his people, his and Freya's, into the kingdom of Albion.

Merlin's lips twitched into a bit of a smile. "But it does entail a lot of work," he admitted. "The druids listen to me and me alone most of the time is a handful of its own."

Freya frowned and clung to his hands a little tighter at the mention of druids; she couldn't help it. Merlin moved on quickly.

"Then there's keeping an eye on some of the experimenting being done with magic nowadays, both to make sure I keep abreast of what's going on and that it's safe," he told her. "And there's the job of eliminating threats with magic. I can't really give up any of that."

Freya didn't argue with him. She had a different idea forming in her mind. "But you're also Spymaster," she said quietly.

For a long time, Merlin had been the one with his finger on the pulse of Camelot, discovering plots and secrets long before anyone else ever did and keeping the king safe in a thousand ways he never knew about. Servants were good at knowing secrets that no one else was meant to know, and the servants had been slipping secrets to Merlin for years.

The only difference now was that sometime in the early years of Gwen's reign, she'd realized what was going on and made Merlin officially Spymaster of Camelot, except that almost no one still knew about it. After all, the whole point of a Spymaster was to know the secrets that crept in the shadows.

Most of the servants knew, though, and some of the knights, and slipped him all the secrets they knew. Freya knew, because she had watched it all from the lake.

Merlin raised a brow at her. "What of it?" he asked.

"That takes a good deal of time and energy for you," Freya pointed out.

"No more than anything else," Merlin retorted, frowning.

Freya drew a little nearer him. "Merlin," she said gently, "I'm your wife, and I'm meant to help carry your burdens with you. Let me be Spymistress."

"You?" Merlin exclaimed, suddenly sharp. "Freya –"

"Hear me out," Freya cut him off. "I have magic; I'm a druid; I know how to sneak around in the shadows and not get caught just as well as you do. And if my being the Lady of the Lake has left me with anything, it's left me with a touch of the ability to See."

Merlin was still frowning at her, unconvinced.

"I'm not saying you have to make any major changes," she said. "Just let me read the notes that people slip you, and tell me the secrets people whisper to you, and let me help you organize them and think through them. Let me take part of that burden from you. What else am I meant to do, just now?"

Merlin scooted forward so that their knees were touching and rested their clasped hands on his knee. "It's not that I don't think you could do it, Freya," he said quietly. "It's – I don't want you to get hurt. And knowing Camelot's secrets – isn't necessarily safe."

"You think I enjoy knowing you could get hurt?" Freya demanded. "Let me share this with you, Merlin."

"Freya," Merlin said very quietly, "I held you as you died. There's a reason I don't want you to get hurt."

Freya turned sideways and curled up against him at that, wrapping her arms around his waist, and Merlin put his arms around her and held her close. They sat like that for a few minutes in silence, reassuring each other that they were together, and safe, and loved, and they had a second chance.

"Merlin," Freya said after a long moment, "you've been running yourself ragged for as long as I knew you. You're used to it now, but it isn't –" She paused and drew in a breath. "Let me help, Merlin. I know how to keep myself safe, more now than I did before, and I'll be careful."

Merlin sighed a little bit. "I really can't change your mind, can I?" he asked.

"No, you can't," Freya said cheerfully. "You'll find me in your office reading all Camelot's secrets, one way or another."

"Alright, Freya," Merlin said, and she could tell he was smiling a bit by his voice. He still said her name as though it was the loveliest name in the world. She still loved that.

Idly, Freya remembered wishing years ago on the bank of Avalon that she could tell him that. She loosened her grip on him enough to look up into his eyes. "I love how you say my name," she whispered.

Merlin's smile grew into the broad, delighted one she loved to see, and he rested one hand on the side of her face and kissed her.

Freya would never get tired of being kissed by Merlin, either.

They went to his office the next day, and Freya surprised Merlin for about the tenth time by obviously knowing her way around – watching Camelot for years was a very helpful tool for going back to live in it later. Merlin showed her what he was working on in some detail, and Freya settled in to organize his badly disorganized files on being Spymaster.

It was a quiet thing, the way Freya helped Merlin in Camelot. It wasn't just with the Spymaster things, of course; she helped him over the years with a great number of things related to magic as well. But over time, Freya took over more and more of the matters related to Camelot's secrets. She organized the whispered secrets, rewrote them in a coded form of the Old Language only she and Merlin could read and burned the other copies that everyone could, and bounced ideas back and forth with Merlin, solving the mysteries they stumbled across.

Over time, the whispers evidently circulated in Camelot that if you had a secret, you could give it to either Merlin or Freya, for over the years, Freya started getting the little hints whispered to her or notes handed. And there were places she could sneak into to watch and listen that the Court Sorcerer was too obvious now to enter.

Freya had been a cursed druid with magic for years. She knew the art of getting into places she wasn't necessarily wanted unnoticed. Merlin got better about not worrying himself to death about it over the years.

It remained a completely unofficial thing, but when Gwen called Freya the Spymistress of Camelot one night, it was for all intents and purposes true.

Freya, the powerless little druid girl, held the secrets and mysteries of the greatest kingdom of Albion in her hands, taking them out of love from her husband's hands.

She was anything but powerless.


	2. Friendless: Bastet

It was spring by the lake, and the first wildflowers were springing up. Freya came dancing into the house, wildflowers falling out of the loose braid she had woven into her hair, and picked up the darning she needed to do, humming under her breath. In the background the baby was crying.

"Freya!" Mother called from the kitchen. "Is that you?"

"It's me, Mother," Freya called back. "Isn't it a lovely day?"

"It's a perfect day for making bread, that's what I know," her mother answered, laughing. "Could you come watch Aldyth for me?"

"Yes, Mother," Freya replied, and tossing her darning aside she skipped into the kitchen and caught up her little sister. "You're going to be too heavy for me to carry before long, aren't you, little one?" she cooed, settling Aldyth on her hip. "Come on, let's go see the morning. It's too lovely a day to be indoors. That's why you're crying, aren't you, sweetheart?"

Chatting to the baby, she took her outside, plucking a couple of stray flowers and sticking them in the fine, dark hair covering Aldyth's head. "You're a perfect queen now," she said.

Edwin pushed open the garden gate and came clattering up the walk toward them. "Freya!" he exclaimed cheerfully. "The first dandelions and chickweed are up in the meadow. You know what that means."

"It means you get to carry the baby," Freya said, laughing and shoving Aldyth into his arms.

"What?" Edwin spluttered at her. "I'll bet my cap Mother gave her to you to watch."

"My arms are getting tired," Freya informed him, after she popped into the house and came back out with a basket on her arm. "I can't carry her all the way to the meadow! Mother," she called back into the house, "we're taking Aldyth to pick greens in the meadow."

"Good!" Mother called back. "Only don't be gone too long."

"We won't," Edwin reassured her. "Freya!" he shouted suddenly, for Freya had broken away and gone skipping ahead of him. "Freya, wait for me!"

"Hurry up!" she called over her shoulder, impatient to get to the meadow. The spring had gotten into her veins and she wanted to laugh and skip and sing, as wild and free as a bird on the wing or a newborn lamb discovering the world for the first time.

"You gave me the baby!" Edwin called after her, sounding very far away. "You have to wait for me!"

"You've already been to the meadow today!" Freya flung back, and scrambled off up the hill.

The meadow they were after was a little way above their cabin, where the stream that watered their fields ran clear and sparkling in its stony banks and the ground was covered in grassy green. Just now it was also covered in early spring flowers. Freya stopped on the edge of the meadow when she had gained it, swinging her empty basket on her arm and shading her eyes to look back down the path to where her brother was coming more slowly, carrying Aldyth. Even from this distance she could tell he was chatting with her, even if she couldn't make out the words, and she smiled. Edwin liked spending time with Aldyth more than he would admit.

"Come on, you slowpoke!" she called out as he got close. "Let's get picking!"

Edwin reached her and promptly flung himself down in the grass, laying Aldyth on his chest.

"You have the basket, you do the picking," he said. "I'll mind the baby."

"Lazybones," she teased him, poking a toe in his side, but she sat down beside him and began picking anyway.

They went back to the house an hour or two later, Edwin carrying Aldyth, Freya carrying the basket full of greens, grass-stained, sun-warmed, and happy. Freya picked new wildflowers and wove herself a new braid, and stuck a few new ones in Aldyth's hair where the earlier flowers had fallen. She even stuck a couple in Edwin's, and he couldn't let go of the baby to pull them out.

Freya was never lonely in her childhood.

The day Freya last climbed the mountain behind her home with Edwin, the dress she was wearing was red.

It was one of Freya's favorite colors to wear, and it was easy to dye. And for a long time after she left home, as she wandered from village to village, trying to find work and food, broken and grieving and alone, she thought nothing of the color of her increasingly ragged dress. Of course all her other dresses had burned with her home.

It was odd at times, however, the way some of the men looked at her. Freya knew enough to know what they wanted in theory, of course, but she skirted a wide path around anyone who was watching her too closely, and most of the time they left her alone.

There was one inn, however, where Freya had found work scrubbing dishes after meals. She wouldn't stay here long – she never stayed anywhere long, too afraid to let herself rest. But as she made her way shrinkingly into the tavern hall to collect a new mound of dishes from the tavern maid, a man suddenly stepped in her way and leaned up against the wall.

"So, little girl," he said, "what say we . . ." He didn't finish his sentence, but his eyes wandered suggestively up and down.

"What?" Freya gasped out, pulling back. "No! Don't you dare come near me!"

She tried to summon her magic to push him away, but her magic had been dead within her since the day her family died, dead with them, and she could call on nothing.

"Hey," a lady's voice broke in suddenly, strong and firm. "That's not what the dress means on her. Back off."

The man turned a sneering expression on the lady who had interrupted, but she stepped swiftly in between him and Freya, putting one hand to her waist pocket and withdrawing something carefully concealed there a couple of inches. She was at the right angle for both Freya and the man to see it was the handle of a short knife.

The man went pale and backed off at once. "I'm sorry, miss," he said. "Didn't mean nothing." And he vanished into the crowd.

Freya wrapped her arms tightly around herself and sank against the wall. The lady turned and looked at her with a compassionate expression. "You didn't know, did you?" she asked.

"Know what?" Freya whispered.

The lady made a motion with her head. "Come with me," she said, "and I'll tell you where we're more private."

Freya probably shouldn't have left her job, but at this point she knew she would be leaving this town at first light anyway. She followed the lady up to the rooms on the second floor.

The lady took her into a private room and shut the door. She moved to sit on her bed, but Freya huddled against the door and stayed there, comforted by the escape route at her back.

The lady looked up, and Freya thought the look on her face was compassion. "First, I'm Luella," she said, "and I'm sorry that you had to go through that."

"It's alright," Freya whispered. "I'm Freya," she offered in response.

Luella nodded and offered her a quick, bright smile. "It's easy not to know this," she said, "but in towns, and especially in taverns, wearing red is – how do I say this? – often an open invitation to men."

Freya felt the blood drain from her face and sank down to sit on the floor, clinging tightly to the sleeves of the last piece she had of home. "I didn't mean it like that," she gasped. "I've never meant it like that."

Luella nodded. "I guessed, my child," she said. "Well, we're not such different sizes. I think a few of my dresses might fit you."

"Oh, I can't – I couldn't – you're too kind," Freya protested.

"But I can and I will," Luella said, and smiled. "Let me. It's my pleasure."

Freya's eyes filled with tears, and before she could help herself she was sobbing unashamedly into her arms. Luella came and sat by her and put an arm around her.

"You've been through a lot, haven't you?" she asked very gently. "It's alright. You're safe here."

It was the first time since fleeing the ashes of her home that someone had been unreservedly kind to Freya.

She stayed that night with Luella, who got her a good hot meal and fitted some of her dresses in colors other than red to Freya. But Freya kept her old red dress at the bottom of the little bundle of things she took with her.

Luella discovered her druid's tattoo when they were fitting the dresses. Freya flinched when she noticed Luella's gaze and covered it quickly with one hand, glancing up nervously. But Luella's face was only rather grave.

"You've got the right idea," she said. "You'll want to keep that covered, unless you want to be on a one-way trip to Camelot in a cage. Let me see, that limits it to long sleeves."

Luella offered for Freya to stay with her, and said she would find Freya a place. But in this Freya politely refused. It was too soon after she had lost her home to try finding a new one; she was too heartsick and restless to stay in one place for long. Luella took one long look into her eyes, sighed and agreed to let her go.

"Why have you been so kind to me?" Freya asked, before they parted.

Luella, for the first time, looked away.

"I wore the red for a time," she said, "and it had the meaning for me that it did not for you. But a man rescued me – Gwaine is his name. If you ever come across a Gwaine with floppy brown hair and a roughish smile and a sword, you needn't fear if he starts flirting with you; he's true-blue all the way through. He's a wanderer too. When he left, he asked me if I needed anything, and I asked him for a knife so I could protect others the way I wasn't protected."

She turned to meet Freya's eyes. "I swore I would protect wherever I could, and so I protected you."

Freya wanted to cry again. "Thank you so much," she whispered.

Luella stepped forward and hugged her, and Freya clung back. "Stay safe, my friend," Luella whispered. "If you ever need help, come and find me; I'm in Crowsdale village."

Luella was about the only person Freya ever learned to trust, however briefly, in her wanderings.

But over the years Freya spent alone, clothes wore out, and red was still an easy color to achieve. And Freya was stubborn; red reminded her of home, and red she wanted to wear. She was cautious; she dyed her clothes a deeper red than should mean anything to any man, and she was good at keeping in the shadows and out of anyone's notice and making it clear whenever a man noticed her that her dress did not mean that.

Of course it was not enough. It was never going to have been enough.

There came a day when Freya was leaving a village in the late afternoon. It was a beautiful spring day, and she drew a deep breath, tossed off the hood on the cloak she always wore, and shook out her hair. Wildflowers had sprung up along the edge of the road, and on a streak of whimsy she picked some and threaded them through an uneven braid she ran into her hair.

Freya hated towns. She hated being among people, floods of unknown people with hard and uncaring eyes. The only place she wanted to be was out in the wilderness, alone with the woods where she was not constantly afraid of being hurt or betrayed to the knights or bounty hunters. Only in the woods could she breathe.

"Hello, beautiful," said a man's voice suddenly behind her.

Freya cried out in surprise and whirled around.

A man was standing in the trail behind her, smirking at her. He was the man who had been watching her most creepily in the town the previous night. Freya gasped in a deep breath and took several quick steps backward.

"I—I'm not wearing the red," she said. "Don't come a step closer if you know what's good for you."

"Don't, hey?" the man asked, deliberately moving up the trail. "I might be able to convince you."

Freya had felt her magic stir a few times, but she had never yet used it since that awful day again. It was stirring now, awakening under her skin.

"I forewarn you," she said quietly, "don't underestimate me. I will never let you lay a finger on me."

The man's face darkened suddenly to rage, and he drew the sword which she had somehow been oblivious to thus far. "Those will be the last words you speak, you foolish girl!" he spat. "I would have left you alive."

He was coming up the trail toward her. Freya realized in sudden terror that she was backing up against a cliff face, where the trail made a sharp turn to go around a corner and run along the cliff.

"Don't!" she cried out.

But he was coming on, face twisted with hatred, and the sword was gleaming in the dying light, and Freya was utterly defenseless.

Her magic awoke, her combative magic that had never awoken before. She knew no words nor needed them. She flung out her hands and felt the heat of magic rush out of her.

The man went flying backwards. He had time for one sudden sharp cry of surprise before he was flung sharply into a huge tree behind him. He slid down it and lay still.

Freya knew by the angle he was lying at that he would never rise again.

She turned and ran around the corner and along the cliff, her breath coming in quick sobbing pants. She went on and on for a long time, unable to stop glancing over her shoulder, unable to feel one bit safe in the wilderness that had always been safe before.

At last, in the middle of a meadow brightly lit by the full moon, she sank down and gave way to sobs.

Not until midway through the next day did she realize that she had dropped her bundle when he had first startled her, and there was no way she was going back for it now.

She had lost all her spare clothes and fragments of clothes, and the little things she had gathered that she valued.

And Freya had lost the rags of her old red dress, her last dying tie to her old home.

She didn't let herself take in the fact that she was a murderess, that in trying to preserve her life she had taken another's life, that the first rush of the combative magic she had once so desired to learn had left a man dead.

If she thought of that she would break, and she could not afford to break.

Being a Bastet was not kind to clothes.

The first night she turned into one, she turned into a relatively small Bastet, and although it was horribly ripped, she could salvage the dress she had been wearing.

But over time, the Bastet grew, for no definable reason that Freya could see, and when she knew the transformation was coming, she took to taking off her dress if she was out in the wilderness and coming back to it when she changed back. Making herself a new dress whenever she changed was not in the least a viable option.

She still stubbornly wore red whenever she could, because it was the final fraying tie she had to the old days when she had been happy and free, and not afraid of everyone she met.

Even more now that she was a Bastet, Freya avoided towns. If she was near them, there was no way to keep the Bastet, which heard every desperate, unhappy thought of her heart, from killing, and Freya hated herself every morning she awoke and realized she had killed. So she kept to herself and to the wilderness more than ever.

There were dark days when she wished she could stay in Bastet form forever, for at least the Bastet was powerful and could defend itself, and she never felt safe anymore in town or forest. But neither did she really feel safe as a Bastet, for it hated all mankind for all the terror and pain it had inflicted, and Freya didn't really want to live hating the world.

So she slunk in and out of villages, more secretively than ever before, and kept the Bastet to the woods, and wondered how long she would manage to survive.

Freya was curled up in the corner of an inn, hands curled around a tin mug of hot milk. She had done enough work around the inn to beg the innkeeper to let her have this. Fall was coming, with driving rain and cold, and all Freya had in the world was a tattered red dress, an equally tattered brown cloak, her magic that could get her killed, and a Bastet that only wanted to kill. She had been bitterly cold for the last week and wanted nothing more than a hot drink to curl her hands around. Hence the moment of weakness in working for a tavern for nothing more than that.

The doors of the tavern slammed open, and a huge, surly man stormed through. Freya shrank into her corner. She disliked almost all men now, and especially ones who looked as if they could snap her in half without a second thought.

This man swaggered up to the counter in the sudden silence his entrance had caused. "Ho, my man!" he called. "Bring me meat and bring me ale. And have you found anyone with magic for me to take to Camelot this time around?"

Freya froze, unable to breathe for a moment. But it would be far more conspicuous when she left now, so she tightened her hands around her mug and took a tiny sip. It curdled in her stomach.

"Meat and ale we have aplenty, my lord Halig," the tavern keeper agreed. "And I think I may have a druid to deliver to you."

Halig rubbed his hands. "Where?" he demanded.

The tavern keeper came around from behind his counter and marched toward Freya. "Here," he said.

"Don't!" Freya cried wildly. "Don't touch me!"

She tried to reach for her magic, but it had been unreachable since the day she killed a man and became a murderess. The tavernkeeper ripped her cloak off her shoulders and tore the one remaining sleeve she had off her dress. He flipped her arm over to show Halig.

"A druid, plain as day," he said.

"Please," Freya whispered, shrinking back into her seat. "Please."

But of course they didn't listen to her.

"Good work," Halig grunted, slapping the innkeeper on the back and making him stagger a pace.

The tavernkeeper smiled, not a very nice smile, and leaned up to whisper in Halig's ear. He whispered very loudly, however, and Freya could hear every word.

"Be careful with her, though," he whispered. "I heard tell a few days before she showed up here that there was a druid girl in red wandering around who was so dangerous even the druids wouldn't keep her. I heard tell she's cursed."

"Don't worry about that," Halig snarled. "I'll make sure she don't activate no curse. I'll make sure she's locked up tight."

Through the cold of the fall, without cloak or sleeves, chained to the wall of a cage, Freya made the journey to Camelot, betrayed by those who should have been her friends and by strangers.

At that moment, she was in total agreement with the Bastet. She hated everyone.

Freya was asleep in the little alcove under Camelot's castle, using Merlin's coat as a blanket. She hadn't meant to sleep, exactly, but the tunnels were dark and far warmer than the cage had been, and she hadn't been able to sleep properly in several days.

Still, the moment a hand touched her shoulder she came awake at once and scrambled up. Dreams mixed with old fears made her flinch sharply back.

"It's alright," a young man's voice was saying quickly, "it's okay, it's me. It's Merlin."

Freya had never really anticipated that she would be feel safe at a man's voice, but Merlin's grounded her in the present at once, and she relaxed. He had drawn out of her space when she flinched and was safely more than an arms-length away. Freya appreciated that more than she could articulate, even to herself.

"And look," Merlin was adding. He held out a little bundle in a white linen cloth toward her and set it down as near her as he could reach without coming any closer. Freya glanced between him and the bundle as he opened it up to show bread and meat. He'd brought down three white candles as well, apparently.

The moment he had straightened the corners of the cloth and leaned back, Freya pounced on the food, stuffing it into her mouth as quickly as she could. It had been days since she had been fed anything more than a few scraps from Halig, and those she had barely been able to stomach. The insecurity of the last few years made her wonder if Merlin really meant her to have this food, and she was determined to eat every last bite before he snatched it away from her.

Merlin watched her quietly for a moment, and then picking up the candles, moved to set them in the dirt. He was moving slowly, carefully, like one would around a wounded animal, and somewhere in the back of her mind Freya appreciated that a little.

Mostly, though, she was realizing how good the food he had brought her was. As the desperate need to eat wore off a bit, the flavors on her tongue of smooth bread and _meat_ burst into her consciousness in their full glory. It was far better than anything she had eaten in months.

"It's good," Freya breathed out, swallowing.

"Believe me," Merlin said, sounding a bit amused, "it's fit for a prince."

Freya wasn't sure what to make of that, and decided he was laughing internally at a joke only he knew. At least he wasn't laughing at her.

He waved his hand at the candles, and without his saying anything they flashed into life. A steady little flame glowed atop each of them, and adding to the torch Merlin had brought, the flames drove back the gloom.

The casual display of magic filled Freya with sudden, inexplicable longing, for the home she hadn't known in years, for safety.

Merlin settled himself quietly against the wall across from her and tucked his long legs against his chest.

"Is that a druid's symbol?" he asked, suddenly.

Freya glanced down and realized the tattoo was incredibly obvious on her arm. She nodded quickly and turned her arm so he couldn't see it. A little piece deep inside of her was screaming of danger, but he had just used magic in front of her. He of all people wouldn't betray her. She had to believe that.

"Were you born a druid?" Merlin asked next.

Freya was beginning to feel a bit cornered, and she didn't like it. "Why are you asking all these questions?" she shot back, glancing up at him from the food she was still busy with.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to," Merlin said quickly, and didn't press further.

Knowing that there was a man who would back off when she needed him to, who would let her have her own space, that he was taking care of her, was a sudden, infinite relief, and Freya felt sorry for snapping at him. "Sorry," she whispered.

"I understand," he told her.

Freya knew what he meant, that as a fellow magic user he was used to disliking questions, but he didn't know. He didn't know the secret that undercut her whole life now. "You could never understand," she murmured bitterly, turning back to the food.

"I know what it's like to keep secrets," he told her, and the weight in his words reminded her that she wasn't the only one who was terrified of anyone knowing the secrets kept close. She looked up and met his eyes, and there was a tired kinship in them.

"Does anyone else know you have magic?" she asked, because against everything she was beginning to care a little about this strange young man who cared a little for her.

"Only you," he said, which for some reason made her glow inside. "And one other person," he added, and Freya thought immediately of the old man he had been with the other night who had seemed to know. "He knows," Merlin added, "but I'm – not sure he understands."

Freya could understand that sense of longing to be known, to be understood, and feeling unseen all the same. It had been her life these past years.

"I wish I was like everyone else," she said earnestly, "but –"

"You always know deep down, you're not?" Merlin asked, finishing her sentence so effortlessly that she knew he, too, had thought that way a thousand times. It made her feel a deeper sense of kinship with him.

"Because I'm cursed," she finished, adding the bit that was true for her and her alone.

"Freya, don't say that," Merlin said so quickly that she knew she had touched on a sore point, even for him, who probably didn't turn into a Bastet on random nights. "Magic doesn't have to be a curse," he added with earnest passion. "It can be a gift."

Freya looked at him for a long moment. She had thought that way once, when she was young and lived in the meadow by the lake and magic was safe. But she had long since ceased to think of it that way. Even apart from the fact that her tattoo guaranteed her death in Camelot if she was caught, she would never have become a murderess without magic. She would never have been terrified of every villager she met if not for the bounty she knew hung over her head. She would never have become a Bastet if it wasn't for the magic deep within her that the sorceress's magic had found and clung to and cursed. Merlin let out a long breath, and a brief silence hung between them; Freya went on eating, more slowly now that she felt safer.

But Merlin didn't let the subject drop. "Look," he said, his voice eager again; he shifted forward, crouching, and spoke to the candles. Freya turned to look at them too.

 _"Hoppath nu swicae swa lig fliehen,"_ he whispered to them, and one by one the flames rose off the candles. Freya watched, transfixed, as three small flames, wavering gently, floated up into the air.

Freya stared at them wide-eyed, something old and wounded settling. She remembered dimly from long ago magic being used for gentle, frivolous things like this, but it had been so long. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Merlin watching the flames and smiling a wide, contented smile.

"Beautiful," she breathed, and meant it from the depths of her soul.

Slowly Merlin brought the flames back down, wavering through the air to rejoin their candles. Freya turned to meet his eyes and smiled at him suddenly, her cheeks aching a bit; it had been so long since she had smiled like this, but she felt safe now in a way she hadn't in so long. Merlin's answering smile was small and shy, but Freya's smile didn't waver.

Merlin looked away. "I have to go," he admitted. "Um, someone might notice I'm missing," he added quickly, as if he needed the excuse. "But I – I'll come back," he promised, and somehow Freya believed him. She let her eyes drop to the cloth in front of her. "And I'll bring you some more food," he added almost playfully.

Freya huffed a breath of a laugh at how well he could read her, and dared to look up and smile at him again. "I promise," he finished, caught up the torch, and left Freya with what was left of the food and the three candles glowing in the dark. She watched him go for as long as she could and never doubted he would come back.

Left alone, Freya finished the food Merlin had brought and curled up in a corner under his jacket, happy to be warm and safe and out of the rain. She couldn't stop thinking of Merlin, of his smile and his tenderness and the way he was determined to see his magic as a gift even if it could kill him.

A breath of air stirred in the tunnel, and Freya tensed, terrified of anyone besides Merlin coming down here, but it must have come from a distant door being opened, for no footsteps followed it. The gust did, however, blow out one of the three candles, and in the dimness of the little alcove, Freya rather wanted all the light she could get.

She could, of course, light the third candle from the fire in one of the other two, but a desire she hadn't had in years to tap the magic within her was stirring. She sat up and held out her hand toward the candle as Merlin had, and tried to call on her magic.

Something deep within her woke and stirred; almost painfully, as if it had to disengage itself from the sorceress's magic and years of being deliberately ignored, but quietly hopeful too, as if it was eager to respond to her call.

The candle flamed to life.

There were tears on Freya's cheeks as she curled herself back up under Merlin's jacket. It had been so long since she had used magic, or wanted to use magic, but perhaps Merlin was right. Perhaps magic could be a gift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I didn't want to split up this chapter, but there's a LOT that I wanted to cover in it, and this has not been a good week for writing (I had a lot of other stuff going on). Neither did I want to leave you without a chapter after promising I'd publish one! So I think I'm going to split this chapter into two or maybe three parts. If I manage to get more writing done this week, I'll post another part on Friday. Sorry for all the depressing backstory stuff in this one; I promise it will continue to get better in the next chapter. Thank you for your patience! :)


	3. Friendless: Knights

The warning bells of Camelot were ringing when Freya left the safety of the tunnels and crept out into the city.

She wanted to stay and let Merlin take care of her and run away with him, more than she had ever wanted anything in her life. But she knew herself, knew that being a Bastet had robbed her of that possibility of happiness forever. She would kill him if they were left alone together, and if they ran away they wouldn't be able to avoid being alone together for long. Already she could feel the change coming on, knew that she would turn into the Bastet this night.

She had meant to slip out of Camelot, make her way away, and survive the long winter on her own somehow. What she had not counted on was her apparent inability to make her way across a Camelot crawling with guards. When Merlin had brought her to the tunnels, she had been so terrified that she had relied on his knowledge of the city and the guards' routes to make it there in safety and had barely paid attention to the way. She blamed herself bitterly for that now.

She had made her way a few streets down before a guard's voice shouted, "There she is!" and the whole group of guards he was with began running in her direction. Freya backed up quickly – ran straight into a cage – heard a chicken squawk – swerved around it, and ran.

They were shouting after her, but she barely paid attention to them in her desperate break for freedom. Glancing over her shoulder, she swerved around a corner – and realized she had trapped herself in a dead end, straight up against a wall.

Gasping, Freya whirled back around and came face to face with the armored men coming around the corner, swords drawn. They were led by a young man whose blond hair shone in the moonlight.

"Please, let me go," she begged, and heard the hoarseness of tears in her voice. The Bastet was coming – she couldn't hold it off much longer – it might get her out alive, but at the cost of how many of the men before her? And she didn't want to kill. She didn't want to die.

The men parted, and – horror of horrors – Halig came swaggering through them. Freya's breath caught shuddering in her throat.

"No one escapes from me," he declared, smirking, and Freya hated him. Hated his arrogance, the way he held her life in his hands, his utter disregard for her life.

He swung the chains off his shoulders – the hour bell rang out – and the Bastet would wait no longer.

Freya fell to her hands and knees, crying out and gasping in her own voice and the voice of the Bastet as the pain of the change swept over her – it was never an easy thing to change. Her dress ripped – the last dress she owned – for of course she hadn't taken it off – and the Bastet was in control.

_Big ugly one had dropped the chain – his fear could be tasted – good, good, good. Blond hair looked almost pitying in his shock – why? Powerful – fast – not to be pitied. Backed up – corner – out of control – escape! escape! Men in her way – no response to growling or rearing except to draw knives and swords – no way except to kill. Horrid nasty one of the chains was pointing knives at her – little measly things – not worth worrying about. Revenge was sweet. Never regret his end._

_Rear forward – roar – the rest were fleeing! Good, they should fear her. Blond hair waited behind – dodged forward – stabbed – no room to back away._ Pain. _Intense, all-encompassing pain. Forelimb too painful to touch to the ground. Get out, get out, get out! Bigger courtyard – men in red cloaks – men with swords – circling all around. Backed into corner again – try to intimidate them?_

_He was there – the kind one with the dark hair – staring at her – he knew her, and he didn't look afraid. Why not? He should hate her. None of the rest noticed – all round her with swords drawn – blond hair had come and was approaching with his sword – she didn't want to die here! Meet kind one's eyes – couldn't he do something? Couldn't he save her as he had promised? Flash of gold in his eyes – crash in the courtyard – men with swords diving out of the way of something crashing – path of escape – take to wings – over all their heads and away._

_Wounded – pain – somewhere safe? Tunnels only safe place. Little corner with the candles once lit with magic. Wounded – gasping – dying._

_Torchlight – kind one with dark hair coming! Must not come – cannot kill him. Growl to make him go. Why isn't he going?_

_"You're all right." Familiar voice. Kind. "You're safe now."_

_He's touching – the kind one is touching – gentle across her head. Why is he gentle? No one else is gentle. The touch is good – almost makes the pain fade. It would have been alright – she could have fled with him – she would never have killed him._

But the chance was lost.

When Freya died, she had thought she would be reunited with her family. Death had instead become life alone under a lake, but she had gotten used to it. She was safe; there was no longer any need to be afraid, if she was the only one in her solitary kingdom.

The one factor she hadn't taken into account in her blithe plan to save the knights along with Arthur was that it meant having people – having men – invade the quiet solitude of her lake.

Lancelot was the first one to join her underneath the lake, and though Freya had admired him at a distance and triumphed when she proved she could do more than anyone expected, still having a man in her lake wasn't at all pleasant. Freya avoided him after the initial awkward explanation of what exactly she had done to him, but she found herself tensing and glancing over her shoulder more often than not in the days following. She had thought she had lost that reflex altogether when she died, but apparently not.

One evening, there was a small festival in Camelot itself; the streets were lit with bonfires, and there was merriment and dancing. Freya followed the threads of magic that let her scry and show the scrying on the lake and watched the happiness she could no longer be a part of – and felt safer, in many ways, not being a part of – for a while, before she followed the threads to check in on Merlin.

For once, he was in his chambers at a proper time, but instead of going to bed, he looked out the little window down to the bonfires and laughter and dancing below for a long moment. Then he collapsed to sit on the edge of his bed. "Wish you were here, Freya," he whispered, and Freya's heart swelled. Dancing with him, she thought, she would be happy and utterly unafraid.

Merlin flung himself backwards to lie on his bed. "Wish Gwen was here," he added under his breath.

Freya wished she was too. Whatever she felt about the Once and Future King who had ended her future, she had liked what she saw of Gwen from the lake, and she knew enough to know that neither the king nor Gwen had all the facts of the case.

Out of curiosity, she followed the thread that connected her to Arthur. She very rarely looked in on him, but for once she made an exception.

The young king was sitting alone in his chambers with only a couple of lit candles on his desk. He had his head buried in his hands and was sitting very still, saying nothing, while the music of the lower town drifted through his open window.

Freya immediately realized she was looking in on a very private moment and swung the scrying away from Arthur back to the lower town. Only when the scenes of happy couples dancing in the streets filled the lake's surface again did she look away from the scry – and realize that while she had been distracted, Lancelot had come over and was sitting on a rock not ten feet from her, also watching the scenes from Camelot.

With a small cry, she jumped off her rock. He had never explicitly joined her in watching them before, and she knew they could be seen from any part of the lake if he wanted to watch. Why was he interrupting her solitude? How on earth had she missed his arrival?

Lancelot looked quickly in her direction at her cry; he also sprang off his rock and bowed quickly.

"I'm sorry, my lady," he said. "I didn't mean to distress you. I—I thought you knew I was here."

"Normally I would have," Freya answered, trying not to be tense. There were several large rocks between them, and the magic of the lake wouldn't let him hurt her. (Would it?)

"I'm sorry, my lady," he said again quickly, obviously able to tell she was still on edge. "I didn't mean to distress you. I promise I mean you no harm."

He meant it, or thought he meant it, Freya thought as she watched his face.

"Do you mean that?" she asked, wishing her voice didn't shake.

"On my word and honor as a knight of Camelot, I mean it from the depths of my soul," Lancelot said earnestly. "I would never harm a lady."

Freya nodded slowly. She wished she could believe him, because he was clearly telling the truth. But he had never done anything like save her from certain death, and apparently without that she was incapable of trusting any man after the actions of men in those years alone.

"Thank you for your promise," she said, coolly, and gathered her long skirts to move away.

But Lancelot was apparently more perceptive than she had given him credit for. "I don't want to distress you, my lady," he said. "And I understand if mere words mean nothing to you. I won't join you to watch Camelot again, if you prefer that."

Freya paused and looked back at him. She thought he meant it – she doubted he was capable of lying – but she also knew enough about loneliness to catch the look in his eyes that said the interaction with her was one he had wanted to go well. She thought he had spent time of his own on the road; perhaps he, too, had known the crushing loneliness of being among people and yet utterly alone.

For that reason alone, Freya's heart softened, and she took a step back towards him.

Out of all the knights she had seen and might one day harbor, Lancelot was the one she believed the most when he said he would not hurt her. Even if she couldn't yet believe it fully, it might be worth trying to believe it with him before she was inundated with knights.

"No," she said slowly. "You may join me to watch Camelot in the evenings, if you promise to leave me alone for the rest of the time."

Lancelot smiled a little for the first time in their conversation. "Of course I promise, my lady," he said. "I look forward to your company tomorrow night." And he moved away before she had a chance to regather her skirts.

Well. It was a start. Perhaps if he kept his promise, perhaps if she could get used to his presence at certain times, Freya would begin to trust a man besides Merlin.

For the next day, Lancelot kept his promise; Freya didn't see hide nor hair of him until the evening. She was curled up on her customary rock, watching Camelot but also alert for any movement under the lake, when Lancelot came and curled up on a rock near her.

She couldn't think of anything to say to him, and he said nothing to her, and eventually Freya was able to stop holding herself so tensely.

When she let the scry go and stood up to leave, Lancelot stood up as well and bowed slightly to her. "Thank you, my lady," he said.

The same thing happened the following night, and the night after, Freya managed to say, "You're welcome, sir knight," in response.

Lancelot made a bit of a face at the mode of address, but he did smile too, and Freya didn't feel incredibly on edge after the conversation. Progress.

Eventually they began chatting a little about what was happening, safe small talk that didn't betray much about either of them. And in the end there came a night when Freya realized that she hadn't tensed up when Lancelot came, that she hadn't for several nights and couldn't honestly pinpoint the moment when she had first been able to let him come near her without discomfort. But he had kept his word, and perhaps she was finally beginning to trust him.

Then came the whole matter of Elyan's possession by the druid boy, which set Lancelot very much on edge, given that he cared for Elyan. Freya assured him that if Arthur executed Elyan, she would probably be able to draw his spirit into the lake to return, but Lancelot didn't seem terribly reassured. Freya didn't particularly want that to happen either, both because she didn't want Elyan to die that way, and because one man in her lake was quite enough just now. Fortunately, the matter was resolved without death.

There had been a couple of moments during the whole debacle, however, when Elyan's distress was attributed to Gwen's banishment, and Lancelot winced every time it came up. After it was all over, Freya's scrying lingered for a moment on Arthur as he made his way back to his room after the encounter in the shrine. Shutting the door, he hesitated for a moment, resting his head against it, then shook himself.

"Gwen, I do wish you were here," he whispered as he moved away from it.

Lancelot winced again. Freya immediately let the scry go, and the only thing that showed on the surface of the lake was the silvery blob of the moon. She tucked her legs up against her chest and wrapped her arms tightly around them.

Somewhere off to her right, Lancelot wordlessly got up to go. Freya gathered her courage.

"It's not your fault," she said, and the words dropped quietly into the stillness between them.

Lancelot stilled, and Freya thought he was probably startled. She didn't turn to look at him.

"What's not my fault?" he asked after a moment, in a rather strangled voice.

"What you did under Morgana's control," Freya answered quietly. "I saw enough of what happened to know. You'd never have come near Gwen as yourself, not after she chose Arthur. What happened was Morgana's fault, not yours."

Lancelot gave a bitter, tired laugh, and dropped back down to sit on his rock. "But I was her ally," he said. "The body she used. And if it hadn't been for the old affection between Gwen and me, it would never have worked."

"From what I've seen," Freya ventured, "Morgana is capable of using anything to her own ends."

"True," Lancelot said tiredly. There was a long moment in which neither of them said anything, then he added, "But the worst part is that they don't know. Gwen doesn't know it wasn't her own choice, that the wretched bracelet made her do it, and Arthur doesn't know that either."

Freya hesitated, biting her lip, then she said very quietly, "Someday you will go back, and you can explain it to them."

"Sure," Lancelot retorted, with an even more tired laugh, "when Arthur goes back. Sometime years in the future. It will be far too late to matter by then."

"I think it will still matter," Freya said, even more quietly.

"Perhaps," Lancelot admitted. After a long moment, he added softly, "But I'm afraid that doesn't really help right now."

Freya wrapped her arms more tightly around herself and rested her chin on her knees. Curled up into the tightest ball she could manage, she whispered, "When I was alive, a sorceress made me a Bastet, a creature of the night made to kill. I killed her and I killed others."

Lancelot was utterly still and silent. Freya made herself tip her head back and look up at the wavering blob of the moon.

"I wasn't really in control – not as myself," she said, so quietly that her voice was steady. "And I've had to make myself realize that, and forgive myself for it. Else I couldn't live with myself."

She turned and met Lancelot's eyes for the first time in the conversation, feeling stripped naked. "I don't think we can be held responsible for the magic others do to us, the things they make us do," she said. "That's their fault, not ours."

There were tears, strangely enough, in Lancelot's dark eyes. "Thank you," he whispered.

Freya managed to smile at him, just a little bit, and then she uncurled herself and hopped off her rock and went to curl up in the smallest, safest cave and rebuild her shell a little.

But the next night, when he joined her on their familiar rocks, Freya found herself greeting him and smiling. They talked and actually laughed a little as they watched, and when Freya let the scrying go and he said, "Thank you, my lady," as he always did, she said, "My name's Freya, and I'm no lady."

"Then I'm Lancelot, not sir knight," he said, with an amused smile.

Freya smiled back at him. "Your word that you would never hurt a lady still holds," she said, half a question.

"Of course," he shot back, sounding almost offended.

"Then I don't care if you see me during the day," Freya told him in a rush. "Only give me warning before you show up."

Lancelot's face relaxed. "I will endeavor to prove myself worthy of your trust," he said sincerely.

Freya, glad he was perceptive enough to realize that she was granting him a large measure of trust, nodded back.

"And I wish I could run my sword through any man who acted inappropriately towards you," Lancelot added, with startling vehemence.

Freya was startled into a laugh, but she had to admit to feeling a bit pleased. "The – the worst one is dead," she faltered quietly.

Lancelot met her eyes squarely. "Good," he said unwaveringly. "I'm glad."

For some reason, Freya felt a little less guilty about the first time she had become a murderess after that, knowing that someone else, without even knowing all the details, thought he deserved death.

Oddly enough, Freya didn't regret granting Lancelot the measure of trust that she had. It was strange, the first few times they ran into each other during the day, but it was nice after a bit to have someone else to talk to.

It wasn't until Lancelot had been in the lake for several months and Freya had gotten very used to his presence that she realized how lonely she had been before she came, with the scrying images all she had to keep her company. Now she had someone to talk to, someone else who understood what it was like to be lonely and who was delicate enough not to press her into friendship before she was comfortable with his presence.

It was very odd being glad there was a man in her lake, but Freya was.

There was never anything more than friendship between them, of course. Lancelot was too wounded by what Morgana had done to him and on another level by Gwen's long-ago rejection to be ready for anything of that sort, so that it took him a few years to heal, and even when Freya realized that he probably had moved past all that, there was still nothing in the least between them. Freya herself was tied for time and eternity to Merlin and would never regret that in the slightest.

But there was friendship between them, and companionship, and that was a sweet solace to the otherwise long days of life in the lake.

Freya and Lancelot were watching the day Elyan gave up his life for his sister.

Lancelot became very still the moment Elyan stumbled to his knees. After all these years, Freya had started to guess that perhaps Lancelot would be the only knight who would die, that she would have to return in this roundabout way, but apparently she had just been lulled into complacency.

"You can do something, can't you?" Lancelot asked, sounding uncharacteristically nervous.

"Yes," Freya answered briefly. Elyan's ties to her were not particularly strong, and he was far away, but she pulled them as tight as she could.

It wasn't enough to pull his soul to them when it left his body, but it was enough to keep it around. Freya clung as hard as she could and was infinitely relieved when she realized they were planning to bury him on the Lake of Avalon. She was sure she could draw him into her realm then.

She was correct about that; as Gwen and Merlin and Arthur and many of the men of Camelot stood on her shores, grieving the noble knight, and flames lit up his burial boat, Freya reached out along the lines of magic and pulled.

A moment later, Elyan stood before them, apparently fully alive and as confused as Lancelot had been in his place. Freya collapsed to sit on a rock; holding his soul near his body for the journey to Avalon had not been an easy task.

"Where on earth am I?" Elyan was demanding.

Freya turned to Lancelot, who was hurrying forward. "You can explain matters to him, please," she said. "I need to rest."

"Of course," Lancelot answered, before stepping forward to envelop Elyan in a warm hug. Freya slipped off to one of her favorite deep caves and curled up on the sandy floor for three days. She couldn't sleep, but after expending that much magic she needed the rest.

Having Elyan in the lake was – strange. Freya was more used to having men in her lake by this time, of course, but it still made her feel uncomfortable and a bit uneasy. On the other hand, even though she knew Lancelot would never have wished his fate on anyone else, he was obviously overjoyed to have a close friend of his from life around, and Freya left all the tours of the lake and the adjustment to this watery realm that Elyan needed to Lancelot.

Elyan had been in the lake for a few weeks before he sought her out. Freya was sitting curled up on one of the highest pinnacles of rock, looking up at the surface of the lake which it was impossible for her to break through and wondering what it would be like to feel sun on her skin again, when she sensed someone coming up to her. She waited, keeping an eye out and rather on edge, until out of the corner of her eye she saw Elyan swim up and perch on a rock nearby, looking rather uncomfortable.

"I beg your pardon if I was interrupting you, my lady," he said courteously when she turned to look at him.

Freya stood up, feeling less vulnerable that way. "Hardly," she said briefly. "What do you want?"

"Lancelot says it's all due to you that I'm here and have the chance to go back," he answered. "I wanted to thank you for that."

Freya smiled a little at his manners. It was easier, now, for her to trust that they were sincere. "Of course," she said.

Elyan hesitated. "I wanted to say, too, that he mentioned you were a druid," he added, a bit uncomfortably, and Freya tensed instantly again. "Perhaps you know this," Elyan was pressing on, "but I was possessed by a druid boy once, and I still have all his memories. I – I understand why you're not particularly comfortable with knights in your lake, and I'll try to keep out of your way. There's no need for you to keep out of mine; this is your lake, after all."

Freya needed to stop being so surprised when the knights she added to her lake were perceptive of her reactions.

"Let's finish this conversation down on the bottom of the lake," she said, partly because standing on the pinnacle was getting a bit tiring and partly to give herself a bit of time to think. Elyan acquiesced at once and followed her at a safe distance down to the bottom.

"I do remember that incident," she said, when they had reached the floor. "The druid boy who possessed you – he had been killed, hadn't he?"

"Drowned," Elyan said quietly. He laughed, not a particularly happy laugh, and added, "I was terrified of water for a little while after that."

Freya nodded slowly. "I know it wasn't easy for you, nor what you would have wanted," she said, "but thank you for letting him find his peace through you. And for being willing to change your thoughts about magic afterwards."

"You're welcome, my lady," Elyan replied. He clearly didn't know what else to do with her words.

Freya hesitated for a long moment before she spoke next. It was tempting to tell him to leave her alone, to not adjust to trusting anyone else, but learning to trust Lancelot had led to both of them becoming less lonely, and she was missing the conversations with Lancelot that she didn't have when she was avoiding both of the knights. Perhaps there would be benefits to letting herself trust someone else.

"I don't want you to avoid me," she said, after a long moment. "You will promise to act as a man of honor and a chivalrous knight toward me?"

"Of course, my lady," he said instantly, sounding offended that she could think otherwise.

Freya nodded and decided to take the risk.

She didn't yet tell him to call her Freya, but she stopped avoiding him at every turn. Slowly, he grew on her. She got him to tell her some of the memories of the druid boy eventually, and she had the idea that it was a relief to him to not feel that he was carrying them all himself, that there was someone else who would carry the memory of the druid boy as well. And though she was never friends with him in the same way, she had to admit it was nice being able to be comfortable with both of the knights that she had pulled into her lake.

Despite the fact that she had lived with the knights in her lake for years, Freya still hadn't quite absorbed the fact that for a time she would have to live with the fact that Arthur, the man who had killed her, was in her lake.

She knew it was only due to him that she'd been able to save the knights, that without his destiny, she wouldn't even be able to live the half-life she did as Lady of the Lake. She didn't even really resent him for killing her; she would probably have killed him given a chance, had killed Halig in front of him, so his reaction was understandable.

That still didn't mean that having Arthur in her lake was one bit comfortable.

Arthur's arrival was a complicated time, for Gwaine had died just the day before, and Freya was holding on to his soul with all her might and praying that someone would bury him in Avalon so she would have an easy time pulling his soul down into the lake. And Merlin was bringing the wounded Arthur to her lakeside, desperately seeking healing.

Freya wished for that to be possible, but with the fragments of foresight that being Lady of the Lake gave her, she knew that Arthur's time had come. She was stronger than she had ever been since she had died, and hated herself a little for it.

She was also pretty sure that she wouldn't be able to get through the initial conversation with Arthur when he came.

Lancelot and Elyan were watching Merlin and Arthur's progress toward the lake with anxious eyes, sitting side by side on a rock. Freya let herself float down to stand in front of them.

"When Arthur comes," she said abruptly, "can you two explain to him what exactly is going on?"

They sat up straighter and looked at her. "Of course," Lancelot said at once. He was the only one who knew how, exactly, she had died; Elyan merely looked confused.

"Thank you," Freya said. "You can explain to him why I can't," she added, tipping her head toward Elyan. And then she floated up toward the top of the lake to await Arthur's coming.

That was one of the hardest things she had had to do, to hold Gwaine's soul with all her strength, to hold the scry on the underside of the lake so that all of them had an idea when things would happen, and to watch her beloved Merlin so desperately seek healing for Arthur when she knew it would not happen. Face wet with tears, she made herself a little pocket in the water near the surface of the lake and awaited the end.

They were near, so near and yet so far, when she knew the time had come. Freya hid her face in her arms and wept as Arthur asked Merlin to hold him, as he thanked Merlin. And then his spirit slipped away, and she caught onto the magic and held fast.

The dragon brought both of them to her shores at dawn. When he told Merlin that Arthur would come again when Albion's need was greatest, her resolve strengthened.

"When I can find a need great enough to send him back, you mean," she whispered indignantly to the water.

Merlin weighed Excalibur in his hand for a moment, and then threw it out into the lake. And for the second time since she had become the Lady of the Lake, Freya could break the surface; she reached up and caught it, and cradled it across her lap. She would keep it and send it back when the time came.

She watched, heartbroken, as Merlin gave Arthur his funeral, alone, and wept with him as he sent Arthur's boat out into the water. But it was easy, now, to tighten the threads to Arthur's soul and bring him down into the lake.

As nearly as she could manage it, she directed him down to land by Lancelot and Elyan. The lake abruptly filled with surprised men's voices, but Freya tuned them out. Merlin sat, crumpled into a heartbroken ball, half in the water on her shores, and Freya poured all her love and solace out into the water and tried to send it up to him. And there was still one knight to whose soul she clung with all the strength she could.

Percival brought Gwaine's body to the lake sometime later.

"Merlin!" he called out in surprise.

Merlin scrambled to his feet, startled – and crumpled when he saw the burden Percival carried with aching tenderness. "Not Gwaine," he said brokenly. "Not Gwaine too."

Percival's eyes filled with tears, and he bent his head, saying nothing.

In silence, the two prepared a boat and made it ready for Gwaine.

"What of the king?" Percival asked very quietly, as they worked.

It was Merlin's turn to bend his head and sob very quietly. Percival said nothing more, but he put a large hand on Merlin's shoulder and pulled him close. The two held each other and cried for a while, and Freya bent her head and cried too.

They sent the boat out into the water, and Merlin set it alight. He was clearly too far out of it to think about the consequences, but Percival didn't even blink an eyelash.

Freya drew all her remaining power together and pulled again, praying this would be the last time she would have to do it, and knew Gwaine had come into her lake at once by the yelling that emerged from the bottom.

"Are you coming back to Camelot?" Percival asked Merlin at last.

Merlin shook himself out of a bit of a stupor.

"Probably soon," he said. "I can't now."

Percival clapped him on the shoulder, and held on for a long moment.

"I'll see you there, then," he said, and set off into the trees.

Merlin curled up on the shore and stayed there.

When Freya had finally managed to talk to Merlin a little and send him back to Camelot, to those who were grieving as he was and who could comfort him better than she could in this state, she floated down to her favorite tiny cave and curled up in it. She was exhausted, and she had two new men in her lake, and she didn't in the least want to face either of them. For the first time since she had become the Lady of the Lake, she almost slept.

When Freya at last felt like herself again, she ventured out into the lake, but she avoided all the knights for some time. Lancelot and Elyan were reacquainting themselves with Gwaine and Arthur and helping them adjust to life under the lake, and Freya wanted nothing of it all.

It wasn't until some time had passed under the lake that she came around a corner and nearly ran into Gwaine.

"My lady!" he said in surprise, stepping back. "Your pardon."

"It is granted, sir knight," Freya told him shortly. And then, because she was feeling rather out of sorts that particular day, she added snappishly, "I'm no lady. What on earth has possessed all of you to refer to me that way?"

"Lancelot suggested it," Gwaine said quickly. "Blame his politeness, not me. He told me that when you tell me I can call you Freya, I've passed some rite of passage and now have favor with the lady in control of the lake."

In spite of herself, Freya laughed. Trust Lancelot to come up with something like that.

"So can I call you Freya?" Gwaine asked, raising an eyebrow.

Freya took three quick steps backwards. "Of course not," she snapped. "'My lady' will do for you."

Gwaine's eyes, oddly enough, had softened, and he raised his hands and took a step back himself. "I mean you no harm, my lady," he said. "I promise you that."

Curse the knights and the perceptiveness they all had to some degree.

"I'll hold you to that," Freya told him, a little less shortly this time.

"That won't be a problem," Gwaine assured her.

He was so sincere, in contrast to his usual happy-go-lucky manner, that an old curiosity Freya had had about Gwaine ever since the first time she'd seen him scrying came back into her mind. The words of Luella, the first woman who had helped her ages ago, floated through her head. _If you ever come across a Gwaine with floppy brown hair and a roughish smile and a sword, you needn't fear if he starts flirting with you; he's true-blue all the way through._

"Do you remember a woman named Luella?" she asked him suddenly.

"Not off the top of my head," Gwaine told her. "Why?"

"I met a Luella once," Freya told him, watching him narrow-eyed, "who told me a Gwaine saved her from wearing the red, and when he asked her if he could do anything more, she asked for a knife so she could defend the defenseless."

The confusion on Gwaine's face cleared up. "Of course I remember her!" he said. "Good old Luella. She made me teach her how to use it, too. She could've been deadly with that knife in seconds."

"She defended me with it," Freya admitted. "So you _are _the Gwaine she talked about."__

__"I would presume so," Gwaine answered cheerfully. "There's not a whole lot of chaps with my name. I only wish," he added, suddenly sincere again, "that she hadn't needed to defend you in the first place."_ _

__Freya found herself smiling a little bit at that, and wanting to trust him on the weight of Luella's word in spite of herself. Maybe she was getting used to this whole trusting thing._ _

__"You may call me Freya," she admitted. "On a temporary basis," she added quickly, for he looked as if he wanted to whoop. "Step one toe out of line, and you go back to calling me my lady."_ _

__Gwaine swept her an exaggerated bow. "I shall endeavor to be worthy of the great honor," he said, and although his words were teasing, his tone was sincere. Freya found herself smiling as she swept around him, and she didn't feel the need to look over her shoulder as she went on her way._ _

__Neither did she ever find sincere need to take back that privilege, though she grew so tired of his lighthearted teasing that when a meaningful look wasn't enough to rein him in, she took it back half in jest several times. Eventually he learned something resembling manners._ _

__

__Arthur was a whole different kettle of fish._ _

__Freya's memories from her time as a Bastet were not perfectly clear, but she could never forget being backed into a corner by him so that Halig could reclaim her, as terrified and alone then as she had been for so many years. She could never forget the utter terror that she had felt as a Bastet with no way of escape except past the impenetrable forest of his sword and the other men's swords. She could never quite forget the pain of the wound he had dealt her, the fact that the Bastet had trusted Merlin because he was kind to her and would never have killed him. She could have run away with Merlin and been happy, and Arthur had ended her life before she had that chance._ _

__Rationally, Freya knew she would never have let herself stay around Merlin long enough to find that out if she hadn't been wounded. Rationally, Freya knew that Arthur had thought he was defending himself against yet another of the magical threats that inundated Camelot. Rationally, she didn't particularly blame him._ _

__Freya was not inclined to feel rational._ _

__She had done her duty; she had brought him to the lake, and she would return him to Camelot when his time came. She would keep the scry up on the underside of the lake so that he could see his wife's reign and his son's childhood in the meantime. There was no need for her to make friends with him as she had the other knights._ _

__So she avoided him, the vast majority of the time. There were moments when she interacted with him, to initially introduce herself or to give him a bit of much-needed advice about his treatment of Merlin. But she much preferred being the elusive Lady of the Lake to interacting with him. Lancelot knew all her hiding places by this time and occasionally sought her out; he came more often and brought Elyan with him when she made it clear to him that it was Arthur she was hiding from, not him. Both Lancelot and Elyan knew how she had died by this time, and didn't make any effort to make her talk to Arthur, which she appreciated. Gwaine she ran into occasionally around the lake; he seemed to be making a determined effort to map out every dark and hidden corner of it that she knew instinctively, which she didn't mind letting him do. Neither did she mind running into him once in a while, but he never sought her out either, and she was perfectly happy with that._ _

__Freya would have been quite content to pass her days in this manner until she could return all the knights to Camelot and have the lake to her own quiet self again, but apparently Arthur, for all he could be thick-headed, had a bit of the perceptiveness of a knight, and picked up on what was going on._ _

__She had come down to watch the scry on the surface of the lake from her favorite rock one evening; no one else was watching it on the rocks at the center of the lake floor at the moment, and she was missing the old days when it had been just her and Lancelot and they had watched together from these rocks. But apparently it was still true that she could get so wrapped up in the scry that she failed to notice anyone else at times, for she didn't realize she wasn't alone until Arthur cleared his throat and said uncomfortably, "My lady."_ _

__Freya herself was so uncomfortable that she jumped and let go of the scry altogether. Arthur was standing a good distance away in the shadows between two rocks, the moonlight glinting off his light hair, but Freya still scrambled to her feet and wrapped her arms tightly around herself._ _

__"What do you want?" she demanded shortly._ _

__"To talk," he said, taking a step into the light. "That's all, my lady."_ _

__"Well then," Freya told him, "talk."_ _

__He looked a bit discomfited. Freya was viciously glad. Let him feel the discomfort he was putting her through._ _

__"I just wanted to say that I'm sorry if I offended you somehow," he said._ _

__Freya felt her eyes grow very wide. "If you've offended me somehow?" she demanded, half-sarcastic. "What in the world would have led you to that conclusion?" She had to keep the waters still forcibly, or they would have started churning._ _

__"You talk to all my knights, my lady," Arthur pointed out awkwardly. "They seem to be friendly with you. Yet you never talk to me. I merely wondered if I had somehow earned your displeasure, and I wished to apologize if I had." He had folded his arms across his chest too, and sounded very stiff and formal and kingly._ _

__Well, that settled one question Freya had had. He didn't remember killing her. She thought for a moment about how to answer him, turning and walking to the highest point on her rock, directly next to an exit. It made her feel a little better, a little less cornered._ _

__"There's nothing you've done since you came to the lake to earn my displeasure, if that's what you're wondering," she said then._ _

__She could see the confused frown flit across his face, knew he was wondering how or when he would have offended her before he came down under. Freya, coldly furious somehow, decided to put an end to his wondering._ _

__"Do you remember," she said, voice carefully level, "a time about eight years ago when you cornered a young girl in a back alley of your precious Camelot? Do you remember staring in wonder and disgust as she transformed into a Bastet – into a huge black cat with wings?" she clarified at his puzzled look. "Do you remember that you brought the wretched bounty hunter who had dragged that girl all the way to Camelot with you so he could identify her? Do you remember that you cornered that girl with your swords before she had done you a touch of harm and wouldn't let her go when she pleaded with you to let her? Do you remember driving your sword home into the black cat's shoulder?"_ _

__A look of horrified, dawning realization was coming across Arthur's face. Freya drew herself to her full height, feeling a bitter justification._ _

__"Because I remember every detail of that night as if it was yesterday," she said coldly. "And I remember the moment I died because of the wound you dealt me. So forgive me if perhaps I'm a bit _offended_ at you."_ _

__There was a convenient gap between the rocks right next to her. Freya ducked through it and hurried out into the labyrinth of caves without giving Arthur a chance to respond._ _

__She found herself the little cave where she had let herself recover after extending her magic in the past, the cave where even Lancelot knew not to interrupt her. She wedged herself into it, curled up, and wept._ _

__She could never remember letting herself cry over all she had lost in her own death before._ _

__Through the shadows of her memory came the moment when Merlin had stroked the Bastet's head, unafraid of its warning growls, and told her she was safe, the moment when the Bastet had known it would never, never hurt him._ _

__Freya would have given anything to be held and comforted by Merlin just then._ _

__

__She successfully avoided Arthur for the next several days after this event, but when she was searching for Lancelot one afternoon, she ran into him in the middle of a sandy plain, lying comfortably on his back._ _

__He was clearly as startled to see her as she was to see him, but he scrambled to his feet at once and said, "Please wait, my lady."_ _

__Freya wrapped her arms around herself and waited. Clearly he had something to say after the revelations she had dropped on him last time, and she decided to wait him out._ _

__"Go on," she said, when he didn't speak._ _

__"I'm sorry," Arthur said quickly. "I didn't remember that I'd," he paused and cleared his throat, "killed you. I knew you looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't remember why."_ _

__"Now you know," Freya said shortly. She still wasn't willing to give him much._ _

__"I know," he said quickly. "And I am – I really am sorry. You have to understand, I didn't realize who you were at the time or what you were going through. All I knew was that a strange creature had come into my city and people were dying, and I had to protect them. But I didn't mean to hurt you. Even then, I didn't want to hurt you."_ _

__"Yes, you did," Freya told him. "And that's alright. You don't think I know what you thought of me? I lived for years knowing that's what everyone thought of me. It's a miracle no one killed me before you did." She smiled, painfully, and went on when he clearly didn't know what to say. "I understand why you did what you did, and rationally, I can't blame you. But forgive me for not being entirely rational about the matter."_ _

__Arthur nodded. "Now if you'll excuse me," Freya said, and turned to leave._ _

__"My lady," he said suddenly, "I am truly sorry."_ _

__Freya turned back to look at him, and thought he seemed sincere._ _

__It was nice to know, but it didn't really change much._ _

__"I know," she said, and left._ _

__

__She was curled up on her second-favorite rock, which was much more solitary, that evening, when Gwaine suddenly appeared near her. "Freya!" he exclaimed to announce his entrance._ _

__Freya straightened quickly; she trusted Gwaine, but she wasn't particularly comfortable with him yet. "Gwaine," she shot back. "How on earth did you find me here?"_ _

__"I wheedled Lancelot until he told me the likeliest place for you to be," Gwaine answered easily. "Do you mind?" he added, gesturing to another rock. Freya shook her head, so he hopped up and sat on it._ _

__"I hope you don't mind my intrusion," he said, "but I accidently overheard a bit of your conversation with Arthur this afternoon, and I thought I might be the slightest teensiest weensiest bit helpful with a bit of it."_ _

__"If you're here to tell me that I should forgive Arthur for killing me because you've miraculously forgiven Morgana, you can save your words," Freya informed him._ _

__"What!" Gwaine exclaimed, shocked. "Not in the least. I'd still run my sword through Morgana in a moment given half a chance, begging your pardon, my lady. I don't blame you for being a bit unfriendly to Arthur in the least. Must be a bit awkward, with only a few of us in here and one of them the man that – well – killed you."_ _

__"It _is,"_ Freya said with feeling, and Gwaine gave her a bit of a sympathetic smile._ _

__"Anyway," he said, "it's not about that at all. It's about the bit where between the two of you, it was rather implied that you spent some time going around as a strange winged cat, occasionally killing people."_ _

__Freya went tense as a bowstring. "I didn't want to!" she exclaimed fervently. "I was made a Bastet, and I couldn't control it, and it was lonelier and more miserable than I was, and I couldn't keep it from killing when there was anyone around to kill. I swear to you, Gwaine, I didn't want to kill!"_ _

__She was breathless and on the verge of tears._ _

__Gwaine held up his hands quickly. "I know!" he said. "Freya, I know that. I knew by the way you talked about it that you didn't want to. That's what I wanted to talk to you about."_ _

__Freya relaxed fractionally. "Oh?" she said, trying to sound interested._ _

__"Yeah," Gwaine answered, not sounding at all rebuffed by her cool answer. He leaned back on his elbows and stared up at the reflection of the dying sun on the surface of the lake over them. "Freya," he said after a moment, "d'you mind if I tell you something?"_ _

__"No," she answered, curious now._ _

__Gwaine didn't look at her. "In all my years wandering around the Five Kingdoms, I got my fingers mixed up in a bunch of stuff," he said, "and there was one time when I was captured by a slaver – never mind why or how."_ _

__He had Freya's attention fully now, but if he noticed that she sat up suddenly and stared at his face, he didn't show it._ _

__"The slaver – his name was Jarl – anyway, he threw me in a pit with a bunch of other guys. Next day he comes swaggering up to the edge of the pit, and he says, 'Which one of you wants to fight my champion?' And of course no one volunteers, so he picks one of us, and his finger lands on me. So he has me and this big, brawny guy dragged into a crude fighting square, and he has us surrounded by all of his men watching us, right? But however his champion got his sword skills, they weren't up to the snuff of the odds and ends I'd picked up over the years, and I've got him dead to rights before all that long. And I'm hoping that's the end of it, but of course I doubt Jarl'l let it be. Of course he doesn't; it's my life or this champion's life. And I say, 'I'm not going to kill for you.' He just grins at me, all crooked, rotted teeth, and sends his sword home into his champion. Then he says to me, 'Next time that's you, unless you learn to kill.'"_ _

__Gwaine sat up then, and looked at her. Freya was frozen, watching him closely. She could feel tears building slowly in her eyes._ _

__"So I killed," Gwaine told her, simply. "Maybe I shouldn't've. Maybe I should've let him kill me the first fight he dragged me into after that. But I didn't want to die, and I didn't care enough about the other wretches he threw in with me to give up my life for them. Maybe I could argue I didn't have a choice, maybe I can't. I don't know."_ _

__"Gwaine," Freya choked out, "I'm so sorry."_ _

__"I'm not asking for sympathy, Freya," he said, with a smile that was a twisted echo of the one he usually gave her. "But thank you. I wanted to tell you all this, though, because you've killed when it wasn't your choice – even less of a choice than was given me – and I know a little of how it feels, how it rankles and hurts and you never say a word about it to anyone, because how could they understand? I just wanted to let you know that I understand."_ _

__"Thank you, Gwaine," Freya whispered. Her heart was inexplicably, overwhelmingly warm with his kindness, and she knew for certain that Luella was right: he was true blue. "Thank you so much. It means more to me than I can say."_ _

__Gwaine's smile spread to his eyes. "You're welcome," he said sincerely._ _

__He leaned back on his elbows, and they sat in comfortable silence for several long moments. Freya felt no need to break it, and for once Gwaine apparently didn't either._ _

__"I killed before she made me a Bastet," Freya confessed at last, and it was her turn to feel Gwaine's eyes on her without turning to look at him. "He – he would've assaulted me. I was afraid he'd kill me. And I killed him."_ _

__"Freya," Gwaine said, absolutely sincere, "if I had known that that man was one of the ones who fell under my sword in Jarl's castle, I wouldn't feel the least bit guilty about it."_ _

__Freya laughed a startled laugh, and felt better._ _

__"How'd you get out of there, anyway?" she asked him, after another silent moment._ _

__"Oh, that's a story worth telling!" Gwaine exclaimed eagerly, sitting up. "So one day a couple of new guys get flung down into my pit, and who d'you suppose they are but Merlin and Arthur!"_ _

__Freya thought she remembered this story now from when she watched it on the surface of the lake, but she let Gwaine tell it. They both needed it just then, she thought._ _

__"No sooner do we have our friendly reunion than Jarl shows up and threatens to throw Merlin into the ring. Arthur steps up to take his place – which, good for him. But of course Arthur's now fighting the champion, who, by this time, is me. So it's Arthur and me in the ring, trying to figure out how not to kill each other, with Merlin's life on the line because of course it is. We both claimed we had good plans to get out of there, but we were reduced to wrestling on the floor before the netting over the ceiling suddenly caught on fire, and we made good our escape in the chaos. Now I think of it, Merlin probably caused that fire. It was a lucky fire indeed, and he was pretty indignant with us about our lack of plans afterwards."_ _

__Freya laughed and agreed with him. Gwaine had taken the realization that Merlin had magic very coolly, only wishing he had dared to find out for certain in life so he could have supported Merlin._ _

__Freya called back the scrying on the surface of the lake, and she and Gwaine watched it for a while. It was fun to watch with Gwaine, for he made smart comments about it frequently that made her laugh. By the time he stood up to go, she was comfortable with him around._ _

__"Thank you again, Gwaine," she said, standing up._ _

__He smiled, and moving toward her, tucked her under his arm in a quick sideways hug. Freya caught in her breath, remembering her brother Edwin hugging her this way years ago, and hugged him back._ _

__"Anytime," he said sincerely, and headed off between the rocks._ _

__

__Freya went on avoiding Arthur for the next little while. She spent time with the knights, but she still couldn't bring herself to be anywhere near Arthur for more than two minutes at a time._ _

__He finally found her one bright dawn. "My lady," he said quickly when she tensed, "I don't mean you any harm. But I wanted to say to you that I am unequivocally sorry for everything that led up to your death. You should never have been brought to Camelot as a bounty; we should never have had that system in the first place. I should never have been lending my aid to the bounty hunter. And when I realized that the creature killing my people was also a girl, I should have sought to find ways to neutralize the threat you posed without killing you. As King of Camelot, I offer you my sincere and humble apology for all the ways I and my kingdom failed you, and if it were in my power to offer you any reparations, I would do so."_ _

__Freya had never, somehow, expected this level of an apology out of him. She stood stiff, staring at him wide-eyed._ _

__Arthur bowed slightly as he finished, and met her eyes steadily as he rose. "I truly am sorry, my lady," he said._ _

__Freya swallowed hard, twice, and found her voice. "Thank you for that," she said. Unable to stay there any longer, she turned and left._ _

__Curled up on her second favorite rock, she thought about his apology for a while. She had never guessed that the proud King of Camelot would humble himself before her that much, nor that he would admit without defending himself that he was wrong about what had happened._ _

__At this point, Freya decided, she had two choices. Go on doing what she had been doing, and avoid Arthur at all costs, thus isolating herself in many ways from all the people in her lake, or forgive Arthur for what he had done and let herself be part of their company for a while before she sent them all back and was alone again._ _

__She had to admit to herself that she rather wanted to take advantage of not being alone for now._ _

__And there was a sense where her inability to let go of her death was hurting her more than it was Arthur at this point. She had the right to stay angry at him forever, but perhaps if she let go of it, she could feel safe in her lake again, she could spend time with the knights again, she would be free of the lingering bitterness of knowing that she had rearranged the future partly for a man she resented._ _

__That evening, when the knights were gathered to watch Camelot, following the tradition she had started with Lancelot, she drifted down and perched on a rock a level higher than them. Lancelot was the first to notice her, followed by the others, but they didn't remark about it much._ _

__She began making a habit of it, and bit by bit the knights included her into the chatter they had with each other. Arthur didn't talk to her, but she guessed that was more out of guilt and respect than any dislike. Slowly, slowly she began feeling less uncomfortable in his presence._ _

__There was a night where they were watching a very simple domestic scene in Camelot. Gwen, Merlin, and Amhar were in the nursery together; Gwen and Merlin were pretending to discuss matters of state, but they were mostly making baby-talk to Amhar. He was sitting on Merlin's lap, but as time passed, he started squirming more and more, until Merlin, laughing, put him down on the floor, preparing to adjust his hold to pass Amhar back to Gwen._ _

__Amhar, however, once put on the floor, squirmed up on hands and knees._ _

__"Oh, are you going to crawl, my sweet?" Gwen asked eagerly. He'd been moving toward crawling for the last few weeks. "Come on, you can do it!"_ _

__As she continued to encourage him, Amhar crawled his first few steps and made it to his mother's lap._ _

__She swept him up and praised him, as all the knights in the lake burst into applause._ _

__"Most praised baby for the simplest things!" Gwaine said, laughing, when the jubilation died down. "When we get back to Camelot, we'll have to embarrass Amhar with how many of his milestones we cheered about in the lake."_ _

__"He's coming along so well," Freya remarked, oddly fond of the baby she'd never met._ _

__"Isn't he, though?" Arthur exclaimed, proudly – and next moment froze and looked up at Freya almost nervously. He'd been very careful not to say anything to her directly until now._ _

__Freya looked down and met his eyes, and somehow she wasn't at all afraid. "Arthur Pendragon," she said very quietly, "I forgive you."_ _

__And somehow it was perfectly true._ _

__Arthur bowed his head. "Thank you, my lady," he said sincerely._ _

__There was a moment of silence; then Elyan commented, "I knew my nephew would be an exceptional baby."_ _

__He was clearly speaking to break up the tension of the moment, but Freya was very grateful to him for it. It kept her from feeling that she needed to withdraw after making that comment._ _

__The next night, she moved back to sitting on her favorite rock to watch Camelot. Lancelot, who had been sitting on one end of it, moved off it at once._ _

__"I was saving it for you," he said._ _

__

__Freya didn't have the strength to scry the whole time, so there were nights when they all sat around and talked and told stories._ _

__One night it was Arthur's turn to tell a story. "I'm not sure what to tell," he said, frowning thoughtfully._ _

__"How did you meet Merlin in the first place?" Gwaine asked him, reclining lazily on his elbows as he usually did. "None of us were there to see that."_ _

__Arthur made a face. "We were both very different people then," he said. "Merlin was a country boy without much sense of manners and even less of a notion of how to treat royalty, and I was a prince who was a prat and probably needed to be taken down a few pegs."_ _

__"Sounds like a story worth telling," Elyan said, grinning._ _

__So Arthur told the story. Freya had never heard the story before either, and it made her laugh._ _

__Sitting there that night, in the circle of knights, laughing at Arthur's story, Freya felt a sense of friendship and acceptance she couldn't remember knowing since her childhood. Only Merlin's presence would have made it more perfect. But not even the fact that she was within arm's reach of Arthur distressed her; she didn't even realize she was that close to him until they were getting up to scatter for the night. Despite not needing sleep, they all had their own corner of the lake that they tended to retreat to for a portion of the night. At least Freya did, and she was pretty sure the knights did too._ _

__As they moved to leave this night, however, Freya took one step closer to Arthur and held herself still._ _

__"Arthur," she said quietly, so only he could hear, "you may call me Freya."_ _

__Clearly he knew what that meant, for a slow smile crept across his face._ _

__"Arthur," he said, adding no titles, and bowed. "Pleased to meet you."_ _

__Freya didn't glance over her shoulder when she left. She curled up to rest in her favorite comfortable cave, not the little one that closed in all around her, and felt perfectly safe._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is part 2 of this chapter, which is growing ridiculously long. God willing, I'll post the third and final part of this chapter on Monday. Hope you enjoyed this bit!
> 
> (Oh, and Arthur's description of what he and Merlin were like when they met is very similar to how Merlin described them at that meeting in chapter 6 of Future of a King, just because doing that amused me. :))


	4. Friendless (Part 3): Camelot

Part of being the Lady of the Lake was a sense of foresight which Freya could never remember having had before her death. Now flashes of the future suddenly came to her, as vividly as the images she flung on the surface of the lake. And one afternoon, shortly after the first time Amhar had joined his mother and Merlin to grieve Arthur on her shores, a flash of insight came to Freya.

She saw a group of twenty soldiers in black fling a challenge at Gwen's feet; she saw a massive battle sprawling below a cliff; and dim and shadowy, uncertain, she saw Arthur leading the charge.

Freya nearly squealed in excitement as she sat up. "Arthur!" she shouted, louder than she could remember shouting before. "I can send you back!"

As it worked out, things were a little more complicated with the knights. Feeling out the magic threads and how to send them back, Freya realized she had to do it in the order she had pulled them under to preserve the magic. And Arthur was most decidedly left for the last.

Lancelot was uneasy when she told him he would be the first to go back. "I don't like this," he said. "I've been back once as a shade already; they won't believe it's really me, and they'd be right not to."

Freya nibbled her lower lip; she saw the difficulty, but there wasn't much she could do about it. "I'm sorry, Lancelot," she said, and she truly was. "But this is the only way I can make it work. You can send Merlin to me, if he needs clarification; I think I should be able to communicate something to him."

Lancelot nodded and accepted his fate like the good knight he was, but he was still frowning when he turned back to her.

"What becomes of you?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" Freya asked, uncomprehending.

"Once you send all of us back, are you trapped in the lake or can you come back too?" Lancelot asked. "I thought you said the reason the Sidhe kept you alive here was to send Arthur back."

Freya hadn't even thought of that in her burst of excitement about finally being able to send the knights back. "I don't know," she said frankly. "I haven't seen my future at all."

Lancelot hesitated a moment, then asked, "Can I hug you?"

Freya smiled and didn't know why she felt so sad. "If you like," she said.

He reached forward and pulled her into a quick, tight hug. "I'll miss you," he said. "I really will."

Freya couldn't say anything; she closed her eyes and held him back for a moment, and for an instant it felt like having an older brother back again.

She didn't know how she'd deal with being completely alone again.

Elyan was impatient to go after Lancelot had gone, eager to be back with his sister and his nephew and to take hold of life once again. But the threads of magic that Freya had bound the knights with had a mind of their own, and she had to wait until she could loosen them safely to send them back.

The Saxon threat had developed and become real by the time Freya could send Elyan back, but she hurried the matter as much as she could. It was a little complicated by the fact that Elyan had been the first knight to die away from the lake, and in tangling his soul up so she could bring it to the lake, she had tangled the magic so deep that it took her longer than she liked to untangle again.

The morning she was finally ready to send him back, they all gathered to send him off. Gwaine and Arthur clasped arms with him, and Gwaine told him, "Don't drink all the ale in Camelot before I get there!"

"I suppose there's no need to send more messages with you," Arthur said. He'd loaded Lancelot with messages to bear to the people in Camelot.

"You'll be there to tell them yourself soon enough, princess," Gwaine teased, nudging Arthur in the shoulder.

Elyan chuckled in the manner of a man who knew he was getting out at a good time. "Good luck surviving each other till you can come back!" he said cheerfully; then he turned to Freya and bowed.

"Thank you very much for your hospitality, my lady," he said, using the title out of respect.

Freya smiled and tried to make it a true one.

"You are most welcome, Elyan," she said gently. And with that she gathered up her magic and shoved him toward the surface, letting his soul go.

As Lancelot had, he came to himself lying on the shore of the lake. He stood up, drew his sword fluidly, and saluted the lake; then he set off at a rapid pace for Camelot.

"D'you want to know what I think?" Gwaine asked Freya before she sent him aloft.

"You'll tell me whether I want to hear it or not," Freya said, a half-smile quirking her lips. Once she might have been annoyed by this; now she was realizing how much she would miss it when he was gone.

"I think you'll still have a part to play in Camelot," Gwaine said, with the earnestness that he could summon when he was particularly sincere. "I think I'll see you again, outside of this lake. I think you'll see Merlin again."

Freya laughed and tried not to let it sound choked. With the last phrase he had hit on the deepest desire of her heart, buried achingly deep.

"Are you a seer now?" she teased him.

"Perhaps," he said, and he was still oddly serious. "I certainly hope so."

Freya looked away and allowed herself a moment of vulnerability. "I hope so too," she whispered.

The Saxon threat had become very real, and was drawing nearer than Freya particularly liked, before the moment came when the magic untangled enough that she could send Arthur back. It might not have been the original point for him to go back, but the magic was thin enough that she could push him through.

Before she went to find Arthur, she fetched Excalibur from the little cave where she had kept it, safely hidden, for years, and brought it with her.

"Arthur," she said softly, and interrupted him where he sat watching one of the council meetings about the war. She let the scrying image dissolve.

Arthur stood up and turned to face her. His eyes widened at the sight of the sword she carried.

"Your time has come," Freya told him. She lifted Excalibur and presented it to him, balanced across her palms. "Here is your sword. Camelot has need of you, and you must go."

Arthur took the sword slowly and balanced it in in his hands; then he whipped it around in a few of the quick twirls he had used to use all the time back in Camelot.

"I wondered where this had gone," he said.

Freya realized with a quick shock that she had forgotten to tell him she had it. "Merlin threw it into the lake before he sent you out," she said. "I have kept it against the day of your returning."

Arthur's lips twitched into a smile. "Thank you," he said. He was wearing his sword belt, and he shoved the sword into its sheath with a firm, intentional movement.

Freya could see the king in the man in front of her, and smiled to herself. "Are you ready to go, then?" she asked.

"One moment," he said quickly, and Freya raised an eyebrow and waited.

"What about you?" Arthur asked softly. "What will become of you now that you have returned all of us?"

Freya laughed a little, feeling a lump in her throat. She would never have believed, once, that the man who had killed her would ask this and obviously care about the answer. She would never have believed, once, that his obvious care would touch her.

"I haven't seen my future clearly," she said, which was perfectly true. She had gotten flashes and nothing more. "I think there's an end to my being the Lady of the Lake, but there's a blank coming and I can't tell what it is."

She did not say the obvious thought that she was sure they were both thinking – that this would be the ending of death, that she would finally go wherever she had been meant to go when she had been brought here to be Lady of the Lake. But Arthur's face was shadowed anyway.

"Whatever happens to you, my lady, I wish you joy," he said.

Freya smiled, and hoped from the depths of her heart that she would be allowed to remain here long enough to see the outcome of the Saxon battle, long enough to see the half-formed pictures of happiness she had foreseen take shape.

"I know you will find joy, my king," she said. And she loosed his soul and sent him out of the lake.

When Freya herself got out of the lake, it was Merlin she looked to first, Merlin into whose arms she flung herself. There was such a depth of wonder and relief in finally getting to be near him again after all the years that she could think of nothing beyond that. Freya had never really thought her deepest dreams of being able to be with Merlin again could come true, and when they did she thought for a little while that she was living in a fairy tale that would end soon for sure.

She accepted the warm welcomes of the knights she knew, but she could barely concentrate on them just then, overwhelmed with rejoining all of them and meeting new people when all she wanted was to cling to Merlin and reassure herself that this was real.

After a couple days back in Camelot, though, she ran into Lancelot going through the halls and was overwhelmingly glad to see him.

"Freya!" he exclaimed eagerly, although the bow he swept her was perfectly formal.

"Lancelot," she said, laughing in delight. "You don't have to miss me."

"You don't know how glad I am for that," he shot back, smiling.

It was beyond strange for Freya, trying to live in Camelot instead of in a lake now. There were people everywhere, many of whom she had seen as shadows on the roof of her lake but all of whom were complete strangers to her, and it took all Freya had not to constantly be jumping at shadows and looking over her shoulder. But to have Merlin and all the friends she had made in the lake – to have her dreams to hold in her hands, Freya would take a certain level of fear.

She walked with Lancelot down to the training grounds, chatting about Camelot, although it was a little different from their conversations in the lake because now they were actually in it. Freya instinctively flinched from the training ground, because despite being around knights in the lake for years, flowing red cloaks still meant nothing good to her. But Gwaine and Elyan came hurrying over when they saw Lancelot with her, and Arthur followed them over.

"Finally tore yourself away from Merlin and came to see us, did you?" Gwaine asked her cheerfully. "What are we in comparison to him, chopped liver?"

"Pretty much," Freya shot back at him cheerfully, making him gasp and stagger as if he had been stabbed.

Elyan rolled his eyes and clasped her arm in the manner of the knights, which touched her rather. "It's good to see you again," he said.

"I told you I was a seer," Gwaine said, recovering.

"I'm glad you were," Freya told him, and shared a smile with him that none of the others understood.

"It's good to have you in Camelot," Arthur told her formally, but she could see the real pleasure under his words, and knowing she would have the odd friendships she'd made in the lake in this strange world she had to learn not to be afraid of was comforting.

"Looks like our resident warlock has come to claim his missing lady," Gwaine commented.

Freya, blushing in spite of herself, turned to see Merlin coming out of the shadows towards them, and unable to help herself she smiled and darted to stand by his side. He held out his arm for her to take, which she did at once, but she could see shadows hiding in his eyes and knew he was a bit unhappy about something.

"Don't you want to join us, Merlin?" Gwaine called out to him. "Like the good old days?"

"I have plenty of other things to do than be knocked half to pieces," Merlin shot back cheerfully.

"That was always your excuse in the old days too," Arthur reminded him.

"But now I have the authority to actually go do them," Merlin told him. "I'll see you prats later."

He put a hand over Freya's thin fingers threaded through his arm and led her away from the training grounds to the tune of a couple of disappointed cries. The scene was not so dissimilar to many Freya had witnessed from the lake before Arthur had died, and it was exceedingly odd to be there with them, a part of the scene instead of observing from a distance. That would take time to get used to.

"Merlin, what's wrong?" she asked when they had left the training grounds behind.

He turned to her, and she recognized his expression instantly as the one he wore when he didn't want anyone to read him. "Something's wrong?" he asked.

"Don't play the fool with me," she warned him. "I can tell. You're bothered by something, and you have been since you came to the training grounds."

Merlin drew a deep breath and led her out onto one of the lower parapets on the walls where they would have some privacy. He didn't let go of her arm through his.

"Listen, Freya," he said, looking out over the lower town and not at her, "I'm not going to be one of those horrible men who demands that their lady has to spend every spare second with them or account for it. I'm not jealous of you making friends."

There was a clear "but" waiting to be added to that sentence, and Freya remembered at once the conversation Merlin had had with the knights on the way to the battle with the Saxons where they had made reference to different aspects of her character and Merlin had burst out in old, bitter anger about how much better they knew her than he did.

"This is about how well the knights know me, isn't it?" she asked very quietly.

Merlin was stubbornly not looking at her. "I don't want to be jealous," he repeated, "but we had so little time, and they had so much with you. And I would have given so much to have that time with you."

Freya slipped her hands out from the crook of his arm; she caught his hands and turned him so that he was facing her. "Look at me, Merlin," she said very quietly. "If it hadn't been for the days we had together – if it hadn't been for the kindness you showed me and what you gave me – I would never have been able to make friendships with the knights."

Merlin looked shocked for a moment; then he shook his head. "I don't think that's true," he began, but Freya let go of one of his hands for a moment to lay a finger against his lips.

"Trust me, Merlin," she said very quietly, "I couldn't trust anyone. I hated everyone in the world when I met you. And you were the first person in years to show me kindness, to show me I could trust. If it hadn't been for you, I would never have trusted the knights enough to relax around them at all, and I would have been utterly miserable for the years they were in the lake."

Merlin's eyes were wide. "I'm sorry so many people were unkind to you," he said quietly.

"Not your fault," Freya told him. She swallowed, looked away, and then met his eyes again.

"You were the first," she said. "You will always have been the first."

Merlin turned their hands to lace his fingers through hers. "I'm sorry, Freya," he said, still hushed. "I shouldn't – I shouldn't be –" He couldn't seem to find words.

Freya wrapped her fingers tighter around his. "You've lost so much," she whispered. "You're still afraid you'll lose this new happiness, that you'll lose me, that you're not good enough for me because you don't know me quite as well as they do, perhaps. _Merlin,"_ she said, suddenly passionate, "I've spent years with the impossible longing to be with you burning as bright as the magic that bound me to you. We have all the time in the world, now. We can get to know each other like we always dreamed."

Merlin looked up to meet her eyes again, and his were full of tears. He couldn't say anything, but he tugged a little on her hands.

He was still shy of touching her, which Freya loved him for because she had been so shy of touch when they met before. But she wasn't shy of his touch at all now. She took the hint, stepped toward him, and burrowed herself into his arms. He held her back after a moment, and Freya clung to him and felt perfectly safe. Neither of them said anything, because at this point no more words were needed.

Merlin never said anything about Freya's friendship with the others who had returned again, nor could Freya sense it as a shadow on his mind. She and he had their own relationship to build, and for once they had all the time in the world to do it.

"I could teach you magic," Merlin offered one afternoon.

Freya had been sitting in the back of the room, quiet and content, listening to the lesson Merlin gave his magic students. She started at his offer.

"It's been years since I learned magic," she said wonderingly. Her thoughts had flown back to the little house by the lakeside and trying to imitate her brother Edwin in everything he did.

"You have it though," Merlin said, almost a statement.

"Yes," Freya admitted. "I've rarely used it deliberately, though. Not with spells or anything like that."

Usually for her it was more instinctive. The wave of defensive magic that had gotten her in trouble in the first place, the work with all the threads of magic in the lake, the prescient magic of the Lady of the Lake that had been spelless and intuitive but was fading away steadily as she lived outside of it. Freya wasn't sure whether she would miss the moments of looking ahead or not.

Merlin shrugged, artificially casually. He had sat down by her and was organizing the messy sheaf of papers, covered in the script of the Old Language, that he had been teaching his students from.

"It's up to you, of course," he said. "If you prefer to let it be instinctive, I don't think that would be a bad thing – not now." Not, they both thought but did not say, like in the days when it was wise to know your magic in order to control and conceal it. "But if you want to learn," Merlin added shyly, "I could teach you a bit."

Freya glanced sideways at Merlin, feeling shy herself. She didn't feel she particularly cared one way or the other, but Merlin had a suppressed eagerness about him that she hated to dismiss. Also she couldn't help remembering his words of long ago – _magic can be a gift_ – and the flames wavering off the candles in the first moment of beauty she'd seen in so long.

Maybe part of their chance together was letting him truly prove that they were gifted, not monsters, to her.

"Alright," she said, and spread out her hands. "Teach me."

"Really?" Merlin exclaimed eagerly, and looking so much like the enthusiastic young boy she had met, he rearranged himself quickly in a flurry of dropped papers to face her. "Is there any spell you'd like to learn first?"

Freya thought of Merlin carelessly lighting a torch as they hurried into the tunnels that first night, of the little flames dancing off the candles. "Teach me how to make fire," she said.

Merlin's smile was so wide that it was splitting his face in two. "That's one of the first spells I usually teach my students," he said eagerly. Lifting his hand to his mouth, he cupped it and whispered a word Freya couldn't catch. When he took it away and uncupped his fingers, there was a little flame burning softly in his palm.

Freya stared at it, transfixed. "Beautiful," she whispered, as she had whispered once so long ago.

Merlin looked up at her, and his smile was a small, gentle thing now. "Try it," he told her, resting his hand on his knee with the flame still dancing there. "The spell's _forbaernen."_

Freya drew in a deep breath and cupped her hand by her mouth. It had been so long since she'd tried doing any spellwork, and images of the old home kept wanting to crowd her mind and overwhelm her, but for Merlin she would do anything.

 _"Forbaernen,"_ she whispered on a breath of wind, and willed the fire to come to her palm.

Trembling a little, she lowered her hand. And there it was – a tiny flame, flickering and dancing in the well of her hand.

"You did it, Freya," Merlin breathed, voice jubilant but hushed as if he couldn't bear to break the stillness, the tiny crackling of the flames in their palms. "Oh, well done."

Freya's vision blurred suddenly with tears; she rested her handful of fire near Merlin's, and with nothing more than a flash of his eyes he brought the flames up to dance over their fingertips, letting their fires run together as one.

"Beautiful," Freya whispered again, awed somehow at how small and tame the magic that had at times nearly destroyed her life could be.

"Isn't it?" Merlin whispered back gently. "Oh, Freya, isn't it?"

Freya had not worn red in years.

In the lake, the only dress she'd had was the royal gown Merlin had buried her in, and that had been surpassingly lovely; it had taken her weeks after her first arrival in the lake to get used to wearing something intact, never mind something so fancy. Of course after coming back, she'd gotten a wardrobe cobbled together quickly from other ladies' wardrobes and quickly fitted to her, with the promise that the castle tailor would go to work quickly in order to have new dresses made for her.

Freya felt it was incredibly odd again to wear more than her one dress, but she knew she'd get used to it. She had only one command about the process.

"No red," she instructed those who brought her dresses from other wardrobes to give her something to wear besides the one dress that she was assured was incredibly out of date.

"No red," she ordered the tailor, when he gave her the measuring tape to take her measurements after Merlin informed him that he would not be touching her. Freya felt she couldn't bear strange hands near her still.

Freya had not worn red in the lake, and none of the knights had so much as thought anything inappropriate toward her, or at least certainly never voiced anything around her. The urge to give up red altogether, to give up that last tie to home, frayed almost to nonexistence, in exchange for the safety that had been so elusive in her life was strong, and Freya gave into it.

She had been wearing red when she met Merlin, of course, and he had respected her. But Freya would always think of Merlin as a beautiful exception.

She was spending time with Gwen one afternoon. Gwen had made it clear that her friendship was very open to Freya, and Freya, who thought there was certainly something to having a friendship with a woman, was trying to shyly respond to Gwen's invitations.

Freya would always be shy. She would always wonder a little bit about ulterior motives and hidden meanings in any friendship. But she was slowly trying to learn to let herself let a few more people in. And Merlin vouched for Gwen, and Freya had watched her from the lake so often that she felt she knew her on some level, and Gwen was very open and friendly to her. It was hard not to like Gwen.

This particular afternoon, Freya was wearing the first dress the tailor had finished for her. It was modest, beautiful, in the latest fashion, and fitted her perfectly, but Freya couldn't keep from fidgeting to try feeling more comfortable in it almost constantly.

Gwen eyed her with a knowing expression. "You're not used to the fancy new dresses, are you?" she asked, and there was kindness in her voice, not malicious teasing. Freya tried to smile at her.

"It's strange to get used to new dresses after only wearing one for years," she ventured.

Gwen's smile was gentle and sympathetic. "I know what you mean," she said. "I used to be a maid, you know. When they began expecting me to grow my hair out and wear the latest fashions, it was so strange – I couldn't get used to them for the longest time. I used to sew all my own dresses, and now I had to wear these new things so fancy that I could scarcely get up the stairs I used to run up and down all the time."

She laughed comfortably, and Freya couldn't help laughing with her.

"You sewed your own dresses?" she asked curiously, because Freya had known something about sewing – her mother had taught her, of course – but she'd never been particularly good at it.

"For years," Gwen agreed. "I think there's still a couple in the back of my closet that I couldn't bear to part with – I change into them occasionally when I need to relax for an evening. Come, I'll show you."

Freya got up and followed her over to the closet. Gwen did have several of the dresses she'd hand-sewn, and Freya looked them over with interest as Gwen showed them to her. But as Gwen was putting them away, Freya's eye snagged on something else in her closet.

"You wear red," she whispered, brushing her fingers against the red velvet sleeve of a fancy dress.

Somehow Freya had managed to forget all the times she'd seen Gwen wearing red from the lake.

She looked up to find Gwen watching her again with a rather knowing expression.

"It's one of my best colors," she said. "And it can mean more than shame for us, you know. It can mean strength and power and determination, and love."

Freya felt as if she couldn't breathe. From a long way away, she heard her voice saying, "You wear it – and no one harasses you?"

"They wouldn't dare," Gwen said, with a grim edge to her smile. "And they wouldn't dare harass you for wearing it, either."

Freya barely remembered how she said goodbye to Gwen without being horribly rude and got back to her own quarters. She dashed straight to her closet and tore one of the dresses off the hook. It had been the donation that had felt the most comfortable to wear in the last few weeks.

She had no idea what spell should be used for this, or what the words were, but practicing spells with Merlin in the last few weeks had certainly made her much more in touch with her magic. Freya stared at the dress; she remembered the red dress she had been wearing, sewn by her mother's hands, the day she lost her home; she called on all the magic she had.

The dress flashed and transformed under her hands, and the next moment it was an exact replica of the dress she had worn that day, down to the uneven stitching in the hems and the faded patches. And it was the same color of bright red that had always suited Freya best.

Freya tore off the fancy dress she wore, not caring if she did it the wrong way, and slipped into the red dress, shaking it out so that it hung correctly. Then she slipped sideways to look at herself in the mirror that they had insisted on putting in her room.

She stared back at herself from the pane of glass, bright-eyed and red-cheeked, hair messed from the quick switch, looking young and carefree and wild. And her dress was red.

For the first time that Freya could remember, she felt like the girl she had used to be, grown into the woman she had been meant to be.

Laughing a little hysterically under her breath, she whirled out of her room and hurried off to find Merlin, forgetful of the people who might be in the halls between. He was just locking his office for the day when she found him.

"Merlin," she called breathlessly, "I changed my dress."

Merlin glanced over her dress, looking a little puzzled as to the change. "You look beautiful in it," he said sincerely.

Freya laughed and sobbed at the same time, and flew forward to hug him. Still not understanding, but knowing her all the same, Merlin hugged her back.

He didn't know, because she had never told him, all the history behind that dress and the color red. But he had called her beautiful in it, and had seen nothing provocative about it. And just now, that was enough for her.

Freya revised her order to the tailor to make everything in red or add some touch of red trimming to it.

"Freya," Gwaine told her one day, "we need to get you to a tavern."

Freya laughed at him, partly because this was a running joke from the lake, partly because she knew he wasn't as much of a drunkard as he liked to sound.

"No," she said, "you really don't."

Absorbed in chatting to Gwaine, she hadn't noticed the guards come up behind her. They passed her and Gwaine now, two of them. They barely blinked an eyelash at her and Gwaine, moving stolidly on their way, but Freya flinched a little bit at their sudden appearance all the same.

It had been a few weeks since she had emerged from the lake, but being around anyone other than those who had been in it with her and Merlin was still strange to her. And unless she was alone in her private room with the door locked, it was impossible to feel quite safe in the castle. All the fear of crowds and open places that she'd had before her death had come back. It was slowly diminishing as those she knew and especially Merlin demonstrated that Camelot was safe now, but the old paranoia was slow to fade.

When she looked back at Gwaine, she could see understanding and compassion in his eyes, but being Gwaine, he didn't push the matter. "I'm just saying," he said, "now that we're all alive again, we have to take part of the joys of it. Imagine it – all of us from the lake, plus Merlin of course, plus Gwen because she comes with Arthur. We'll bring Amhar along too, to keep us accountable – we can't stay out too late with the munchkin around. Doesn't it sound glorious?"

"To you, maybe," Freya shot back.

But somehow she got wheedled into it in the end. Merlin took her down to what Gwaine proclaimed was the finest inn in Camelot one evening. Freya was wearing the red dress she had changed with magic and had done her own hair very simply, determined not to pretend to be the fine lady of Camelot she really wasn't this night of all nights, among people she counted friends.

Lancelot, Gwaine, and Elyan were already at the inn, and welcomed her and Merlin warmly. Arthur, Gwen, and Amhar joined them shortly afterwards. All of them were dressed in ordinary clothing, nothing to suggest that they were some of the most important people in Camelot. Gwen was wearing the simple purple dress she had once made herself. Merlin was wearing his old blue shirt with red neckerchief and brown jacket; when Freya shivered a bit, later in the evening, he took off the jacket at once and draped it around her shoulders. Freya looked up at him, smiling; it still smelled the same as it had all those years ago. She wiggled her arms through the sleeves and wore it for the rest of the night.

There was, she had to admit, something to Gwaine's suggestion. She trusted everyone in the group, with the possible exceptions of Gwen and Amhar, and she was learning to trust them. Her back to the wall, knowing no one she distrusted was behind her, Freya let herself relax, even though there were strangers in the room.

No one came up to her to harass her; no one even blinked an eyelash at her red dress; all the strangers they interacted with were open and friendly and respectful.

Maybe it wouldn't be so hard learning how to be human instead of the Lady of the Lake again.

Not if she had Merlin and the people she had learned to trust around her.

Not if she had friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is at last the third and final part of this chapter! Hopefully you enjoyed. :)
> 
> I actually liked having the time to flesh things out and the ability to write this chapter in segments instead of in one massive chapter. If the future chapters of this story grow long, I may start posting them in two parts, one on Monday and one on Friday. We'll see. Next chapter starts on Monday, at least. :)


	5. Homeless

Freya grew up a druid, but not the typical druid way. Her family had their own farm, and were not part of any druid clan.

One time when she was perhaps five, a whole clan of cloaked people appeared suddenly on the path leading up to their house. She and Edwin, who had been playing in the garden, shrieked and ran to call their parents. The strangers were wearing dark cloaks, not the dreaded red cloaks, but it was still the first time Freya could really remember seeing strangers at their house.

Neither Father nor Mother seemed particularly perturbed, however; they came out into the front garden to meet the visitors.

"Isildur," Father greeted their leader, sounding very pleased.

"Godfrith, Aslief," the other greeted Father and Mother stolidly, exchanging bows with them. "You have done well for yourself, I see."

"Quite well," Father agreed. "Our farm has flourished."

"Edwin, Freya, come," Mother called gently. "These are the people we lived with before we settled down with you."

Neither Edwin nor Freya cared much for the grownup friends of their parents, but there were a few children among them, and showing the children around the farm, which seemed an almost unfamiliar concept to them, was great fun. Also the strangers had marvelous magic which they didn't hesitate to show off. On the last night of their short stay, Father built a bonfire out behind the house, and everyone gathered around it, and the camp bard told stories. He shaped them in the flames and the sparks and the smoke, and Edwin and Freya sat awestruck against their mother's skirts and watched until they fell asleep.

The druids didn't come by often, but once in a while after that they would show up, mysteriously appearing in the lane a few dozens of yards from the gate and coming up in their mysterious, comforting dark cloaks. They were not always the same clan, but the cloaks never really changed. After that first time, Edwin and Freya would tear out of the gate and run to meet them pell-mell, begging for stories in the fire. The bard never failed to oblige on some night of his visit.

But as Edwin and Freya grew older, their visits became rarer and rarer; after Freya became a teenager, she couldn't remember them coming at all. Their baby sister Aldyth had never seen a druid outside of their family, nor seen stories dance in the campfire.

When Freya saw her first home go up in flames, she didn't immediately think of the druids as a place to go.

For the first several months, she was in shock, and dealing with how exactly to survive to the next day, the next week, was all-consuming. It was a long time before she even felt safe enough to think ahead to the next month.

Even when she did begin wondering in a vague sense about the longer term, the druids were not an option she thought of. They were mystic, cloaked figures, myths of her vanished childhood, not a reality in the cold world she lived in now.

That is, until one evening when she overheard a conversation between two men in a town square. Freya overheard a lot of conversations, because she was small and inconspicuous, and no one noticed her. It saved her life more than once. (It would one day make her a good Spymistress.)

"I haven't seen naught of Lennox since the bounty hunter came through," one man was saying. "Yet I didn't see him in his cart. You seen him?"

There was an edge of real worry that undercut the casualness of the words.

"Nope, I ain't seen him," the other man returned lazily.

Freya caught no undertone to his words and, hating him for his carelessness, began edging away. The druid tattoo, hidden safely under Luella's long sleeves, seemed to burn.

But the first man straightened suddenly to his not inconsiderable height. "You have," he said sharply. "You know summat about him, Col, or I'll eat my hat. Spit it out!"

"Not in the middle of the square," Col spat back, and his voice, though low, was as sharp as his friend's. He grabbed his friend by his shoulder and dragged him sideways into an alley. Freya let herself be swept along by the crowd to the side of the market near the alley; for some reason she was desperately curious about the marked Lennox's fate.

Col glanced in every direction before he told his story, but of course he didn't notice Freya. He leaned forward till his whiskers nearly brushed his friend's ear, but Freya could just make the words out.

"They say he went to the druids," Col whispered. "They say the druids will take in anyone who's in distress and give them a home. That's as where he went."

His friend relaxed as Col leaned back and smiled in Col's anxious face. "Good," he said simply. "I'm glad to know."

Freya was standing stock still, not letting herself drift along. The mention of druids had suddenly called up the image of the cloaked figures of her childhood, of figurines dancing in flames and smoke, and a sudden strange longing filled her. Col had said the druids would take in anyone in distress.

Col and his friend, striding away across the market, never knew how close Freya came to slipping up to them and asking if they knew the way to the druids. But even then, long before the Bastet, she was too shy of men to do it, and only stood there and watched them until they were hidden by the crowd from view.

From then on, it was Freya's goal and ambition to find the druids and find herself a home with them. They were harder to find than anyone had expected, however; she picked up tidbits about them, a bit here and a bit there, but she had never found an actual druid before the day she became a Bastet.

Afterwards Freya became even more desperate to find them. If she could join the druids, she was sure, they would know how to undo what had been done to her.

Not long after that dreadful day, Freya sneaked into a village. She doubted the Bastet was coming that night, and she was desperately in need of cloth. Her last dress had been torn terribly during a transformation, and she needed cloth to repair it.

She meant to sneak in, find a way to pay for or steal the cloth, and sneak out again, but as she was buying the cloth at a little stall with money she had made helping a farmer's wife with her chores, the weaver selling the cloth reached out and caught Freya's wrist.

Freya froze instantly. That was the arm that had her tattoo on it, and the sleeve of her dress had been ripped from shoulder to wrist during the transformation. It was all she could do to keep the tattoo covered.

But the weaver, with firm, sure fingers, pushed up the sleeve, and with one finger traced lightly over the tattoo.

Freya couldn't breathe.

"Please," she gasped out, "please don't turn me in."

"Turn you in?" the weaver whispered. Her eyes were kind. "I never meant to do that."

She let go of Freya's arm and bundled up the cloth Freya had bought. But as she passed it over to a still-frozen Freya, she whispered, "There is a druid's camp near here. Go a thousand steps north on the road, then seventy-five steps towards the mountains, and you will find it."

Freya was staring at the weaver; she couldn't help it. After all these years, she finally had her directions to a druid camp!

"Well, get on with you then," the weaver told her, laughing, but Freya knew, too, that her reaction had been foolish. Any information about the druids was costly and could come at a price.

"Thank you, my lady," she whispered, choking. Then she gathered the cloth to her breast, settled her bundle on her back, and hurried toward the druid camp as fast as she could go.

Somehow, just then, Freya had no doubts the druids would take her in.

Even if she was a Bastet.

She found the camp. It was half-hidden in a cave and under the vines, but it wasn't impossible to spot.

Freya was seen just after she spotted the camp. "Halt!" a druid said quickly, stepping toward her and fiddling with the edges of his cloak. "What do you want here?"

Freya froze and held herself still. "I – I wish to join your camp," she said, and her voice did not waver.

The druid nodded slowly. "I will take you to our leader Ruadan," he told her.

Freya followed him meekly through the camp. She felt eyes on her from every direction, and her heart was beating wildly, but she would not let herself be afraid. She had the druid tattoo; they would heal her of the Bastet; she would be whole and she would have a home again.

The man led her deep into the center of the camp, until they came to one of the larger tents. A tall man with graying hair was just stepping out of it, and the druid guard bowed to him.

"A newcomer who wishes to join us," he explained, and motioned to Freya.

Ruadan turned to look at her with piercing eyes. "And why do you wish to join us?" he asked, his tone somewhere between inquiring and a threat.

Freya had to swallow twice before she could find the courage to extend her arm, and for the first time in years, deliberately display her tattoo.

Ruadan's eyebrows relaxed when he saw it. "That's good, then," he said – then suddenly he frowned again. "How did you come to leave your first camp?" he demanded, and now his tone was sharp. "Were you forced out?"

"No!" Freya cried. "No, sir, I never had a camp. It – it was just me and my family. And they are dead."

She declared her family's fate without faltering and met his eyes when she said it, but she had to swallow hard immediately afterwards. It was the first time she had said it out loud.

Ruadan seemed to relax again. "Well, that's better," he said, and now his voice was warming up. "You may stay with us then, my child. Welcome to the camp."

He was about to turn and walk away, and Freya was about to sink to the ground in sheer relief. But she stiffened herself and called "Wait!" after him. There was one more thing she had to say.

"What is it?" he demanded shortly, turning back.

Freya forced herself to meet his eyes. "There was a sorceress," she said quietly. "She was very angry with me. She cast a spell on me."

Ruadan looked wary again. "What kind of spell?"

"She made me a Bastet," Freya burst out in a rush. "Can – can't you reverse it?"

There were audible gasps around her when she said what she had become, and though Freya had barely been conscious of others around during this interview, she now sensed far too many eyes fixed on her in horror. She shrank into herself.

"Perhaps," Ruadan said. His face was blank. He stepped forward to press his fingertips against her forehead and closed his eyes; Freya kept herself from flinching at his hand, her heart beating so hard it hurt.

But barely thirty seconds had passed before the druid leader reeled back, his narrow eyes flying wide open in horror.

"There is nothing I can do," he said. "The spell is bound irrevocably to your magic, and there is no one who can undo it." He turned to the druid guard. "Get her out of the camp," he said, his voice hard.

"What!" Freya cried, desperate. "You – you take all who are in need. Please, please don't –"

Ruadan did not look at her. "You are a killer," he said coolly. "You have killed before and you will again. I cannot have anyone in my camp who cannot restrain themselves from killing."

Freya felt as though every dream she had was being shredded and left in pieces around her feet. "Please," she whispered, almost inaudible. "I can't – surely you can find some way to contain it."

The druid turned and met her eyes for a fraction of a moment before he looked away again.

"I am sorry," he said, and in that moment he sounded almost sincere. "But I must put the safety of my people above the safety of a stranger. Perhaps somewhere else you can find rest. Alcywn."

At the curt snap of his name, the druid guard stepped quickly toward Freya. But Freya could not bear the thought of a man's hands on her to roughly escort her out. With a wild sob, she turned and fled from the camp.

The Bastet came roaring out that night, furious and hurt by Ruadan's examination of it and his denunciation of it as a killer. It tried to find and attack the druid camp, and would have succeeded except that they were armed and ready and drove it off, as it valued safety even above the death of its enemies.

But from that day forward Freya could tell druids when she met them in the towns, not by their cloaks anymore but because they subtly shrank away from her, and she knew the word had spread. _Beware the druid girl who becomes a Bastet. She is not one of us._

Freya shrank away from them in shame and nameless fear. And she gave up the last dream that had been driving her since the day she overheard Col's conversation in the market square, the dream of having a home again.

Dreamless, hopeless, a murderess, she wandered on alone.

Freya was awake the second time Merlin came with food.

Awake, and huddled in his jacket against the wall, trying not to cry.

This couldn't last, this little respite, this little moment of hope snatched against the dark. She couldn't stay down in these tunnels with the only man who had been kind to her since her home was gone coming to visit. It couldn't last because sooner or later she would turn into a Bastet, and he would hate her, and that would ruin everything.

She heard him before she saw him, heard his quiet footsteps along the tunnels and knew them for his. When he stepped around the corner in a flash of torchlight, she knew him and felt safe. Which was a odd feeling to have, to say the least.

"I'm sorry I took so long," he said quietly, and meant it, too.

Freya scrubbed the last remnants of tears from her face and uncurled from under her coat. Merlin put down the torch and came over to kneel in front of her, holding out a cloth-bound bundle. "You must be hungry," he said.

Freya was, though not nearly so hungry as last time. She wouldn't need to bolt the food down at once; she trusted Merlin not to take it away from her, if he was this worried about her hunger. Still, she took the little bundle as he held it out to her at arms length.

Merlin was apparently more observant than she would have liked him to have been, though, for he asked suddenly, "What is it?"

It had been so long since anyone had asked her that, longer since anyone had meant it.

Freya still wasn't going to answer. She didn't want Merlin to know she was a Bastet.

"Nothing," she said quickly.

"But you're upset," he pressed.

"No," she shot back, trying to swallow the tears out of her voice and smiling at him a bit. It came easier than it would have before.

"Did you think I wasn't coming?" he asked, jumping to his own conclusion. "But I promised you I would."

And the oddest part of it all was that Freya had never doubted that. She looked up at him with a smile and offered him a part of the truth. "I scare most people away," she said, thinking of the druids who had turned away from her.

"I'm not most people," Merlin shot back cheekily, and Freya's smile became a bit truer as he huffed a bit of a laugh to himself. Clearly he was determined not to be scared away by her.

Freya decided to bask in that while it lasted.

He rose to his knees and began settling another candle onto a little ledge on the wall; Freya was pleased at the prospect of more light. She looked down in the napkin and saw sausages. Sausages! Really, Merlin brought her feasts.

"How long had you been in that cage?" he asked her.

Freya didn't mind his questions as much by now. "A few days," she muttered. A few of the longest days of her life.

"And the bounty hunter?" Merlin asked.

"Halig," Freya told him.

"How did he find you?" he finished his question.

Freya sniffed, trying not to let herself cry again, trying not to remember. "You can't always trust people," she told him, lifting her eyes to look at him.

"I know," Merlin told her, in a tone that said that he really did. He settled down to sit crosslegged opposite her. "That's why I left home."

It was the first time he had volunteered anything about himself, and Freya found herself curious about him. "Where is home?" she asked him.

"Ealdor?" He said the name as if he thought she might know it, but Freya couldn't remember ever hearing of it before. She watched his face closely as he went on, a bit deprecatingly, "It's a small village." He shrugged. "Just a few fields, couple of cows, it's nothing special."

But it was a home, and he still called it that. Freya found herself smiling, almost laughing, at his description. Merlin smiled too, and huffed a bit of a laugh.

And Freya decided to volunteer a bit of information about herself, freely, for the first time in she didn't know how long. Because she wanted someone else besides her to carry on the memories. Because she thought Merlin might actually care to know. Because, however foolishly, she was dreaming of home again a little.

"My home was next to a lake," she said, "surrounded by the tallest mountains."

Merlin was watching her as closely as she had watched him, and clearly interested, so Freya went on. She couldn't help smiling as she recalled.

"In the winter the storms whipped up the water into waves and you thought they were going to crash down and take away all the houses. But in the summer –" She tilted her head, remembering the fields and the flowers and running with Edwin and Aldyth through the grasses. "Wildflowers and light. It was like heaven."

"Sounds perfect," Merlin said softly.

"It was," Freya told him. Because it had been, and she could never lose those perfect memories.

But Merlin picked up on her verb tense. "Was," he asked, and there were hints of concern in his tone.

Freya looked away. "My family died," she told him, speaking to her lap.

It still wasn't easy to say the words.

"Have you been on your own ever since?" Merlin asked softly.

Freya nodded quietly. He had hit the truth.

"You're not on your own any more," Merlin told her steadily, and Freya couldn't help looking up at him. "I'm going to look after you."

How she wished, oh how she wished he could!

She looked away, and he got the sense of her gesture, because he added, "I promise," to his words.

"You can't look after me," Freya told him, moving the little parcel of food to the ground and placing her hands over it. "No one can." The druids had proved that, and she had to crush this dream of home before it overtook her.

"I don't think you understand," Merlin said quickly. He reached forward and caught her hand in his. It was the first time he had touched her, and oddly, a quick thrill ran through Freya.

Merlin met her eyes steadily. "I've – never known anyone like you," he said earnestly.

He glanced down at their hands and, seeming to realize for the first time that he had grasped one of hers, he moved to pull away. And suddenly Freya felt she couldn't bear it if he did. She reached out with her other hand and caught his. She wanted his fingers against hers – she wanted his touch – she was unafraid of it somehow.

And for the moment Freya gave herself in to the dream. She gave into the tenderness in Merlin's eyes as he met hers again, to the gentleness of his touch, to the way he wanted to take care of her, and she let herself dream of home.

"I wish I could stay," Merlin said, shaking his head, and again she could tell he was truthful.

"You're going?" she asked, and her voice caught. Somehow she didn't want him to go.

"We need to be careful," he told her, which was as good as yes. Freya looked away, down to their still clasped hands. "I'll come back in the morning," Merlin promised quickly. He leaned forward. "Freya, you know I will be back, don't you?" he asked.

Freya smiled in spite of herself and nodded. She trusted him.

He met her eyes for one more moment, then pulled away; Freya clung to his hands till they were gone.

"Merlin," she said as he picked up the torch, and he turned to look at her. Freya looked up at him, unafraid. "I've never known anyone like you either," she said, and meant every word.

He hesitated, then smiled at her, his full, bright smile that she was coming to love. Then he nodded at her and was gone.

Freya curled herself back under his coat, chewed on a sausage, lit the new candle with magic, and dreamed.

When Freya came back to herself after turning into the Bastet for the last time, she knew four things: she was in the tunnels where she had felt safe, she was wounded to the death, she was naked, and Merlin would hate her.

He had been there in the courtyard. He had found her when she ran back into the tunnels. He knew what she was, and he would hate her as the druids had.

And Freya couldn't take that.

Her last dream of home had been fruitless, she knew that. She had dashed it to pieces herself. But she couldn't bear to see the disgust in his eyes, to know that she was a monster to him too.

He came, light footsteps and torchlight. Freya was sobbing uncontrollably from the pain on multiple levels, unable even to curl in on herself. She buried her face in her arms and didn't look at him.

Merlin set the torch down, as he always had, and the next thing she knew, a warm coat had been placed over her, covering her up. The little touch of kindness undid her completely.

Gasping between sobs, she tried to move onto her side. Merlin was leaning over her, his face filled with worry and concern. He stroked her hair out of her face, and Freya had never loved him more. She had never hated being a monster more.

"You must hate me," she breathed out.

"No," Merlin said quickly.

"I'm a monster," Freya sobbed. It was the complete, unadulterated truth. She glanced up and met Merlin's eyes. "I tried to tell you."

"I know," Merlin whispered, gently.

He would leave her. He would leave her as the druids had. But she had to tell him. She had to let him know why she had become this way. It had never mattered before, but it mattered that he knew.

"I wasn't always like this," Freya told him, closing her eyes. It was too hard to keep them open.

"Shh," Merlin told her. "You shouldn't try to talk."

Didn't he see? Nothing mattered now but that he knew, that he could remember her as something other than a monster. She was desperate for him to see.

"There was a man," she told him. She had never told anyone this before. "He attacked me. I didn't mean to hurt him, but I thought he was going to kill me."

"It was an accident," Merlin told her, and that understanding comforted her somewhere deep down even as she plunged ahead with the story.

"His mother was a sorceress, and when she found out that I'd killed her son –" Freya turned and forced her eyes open to meet his. "She cursed me to kill forevermore."

But there was no judgement in his eyes, no cry of "Murderess!"

The pain of the wound lanced through Freya, and she turned away. Merlin's arms tightened around her.

"I'm going to make you better, Freya," he vowed to her.

"No, Merlin," she protested. She knew better. She was gasping for breath now. "The wound's too deep. Please go."

She didn't want him to stay if he would think she was a monster who deserved this.

"No," Merlin said simply, and kept his arms around her. "I'm not leaving you here."

And he didn't.

That was his reaction to knowing, to knowing the darkest secret of her past that she had tried to hide from him. He stayed with her, all the way to the end. And there was no disgust, no judgement, no fear in his eyes.

He loved her. That was when Freya knew it.

And that was why she clung to the dream of a home with him, however distant and impossible of a dream it was, through all the years in the lake. Because he had given her the dream. Because no action of his had dashed it. Because Freya yearned to believe that someday, someday she could have a home.

It took Freya a long time after she reunited with Merlin to believe she could have a home.

It had been a pipe dream for so long, something she danced to the tune of but never truly believed could come true. There was a fragility to her happiness in those early days back in Camelot, waiting for the other shoe to drop and shatter it all.

But there was no longer a Bastet to break everything. That had truly died with her death, to Freya's infinite thankfulness.

The day she met Merlin in a meadow under the trees, dressed in white, her hair arranged by Gwen, and he took her hands as gently as he had in the tunnel long ago, and they made their vows to be man and wife, Freya finally started to believe she had found a home.

She found it hard to forgive the druids for throwing her out, however.

There had been ways to contain the Bastet – she knew that from the last night when, even wounded, it had settled under Merlin's touch. But they had all shrunk away from her in fear and never even cared to try to find those ways. They had crushed her dreams and thrown her out to wander.

Freya knew perfectly well that Merlin was the only one the druids would listen to, and that he acted as a liaison between them and the King and Queen. It was the only part of his work that she refused to have much to do with. She would help him organize papers or talk things over when he needed to, but she refused to have any contact with the druids. The memories of the druids cringing away from her, of the rumors even reaching Halig's ears, were too strong.

The druid leaders had started a tradition of meeting in Camelot every five years to hold council. It gave them a neutral ground to discuss matters that gave no one leader advantage over another, and Lord Emrys there to watch over them. When the first of these councils since Freya's return rolled around, Freya kept to her room most of the time. There were druids everywhere in Camelot, and she didn't want to deal with them.

"I'm sorry, Freya," Merlin told her one morning, holding her hands. "I wish it wasn't like this for you."

"It's not your fault," Freya told him smiling, because it really wasn't. "Go deal with all the druids for me."

Merlin sighed. "At least you get to do interesting things during the day," he grumbled. "I just have to listen to a lot of bickering."

Freya laughed, which was obviously his intent, because his face lighted with his bright smile the moment she laughed. He leaned forward and kissed her forehead very gently.

"I'll see you at noon," he promised, and turned to go. Freya clung to his hands until the last moment again.

Despite having books and sewing and anything that might occupy a proper fine lady in her room, Freya was very bored by the time the hour got near noon, and she decided to go find Merlin rather than wait for him to come fetch her. A walk through the back passageways of the castle that she knew would be quiet would do her good. She didn't try to seek him out with her mind, though she knew she could find him in an instant that way when she really needed him; at the moment she needed the walk more than a destination.

Freya realized her mistake, however, when she opened a door to make a shortcut and faced a roomful of druid leaders sitting around a table.

Her mistake had been not clarifying with Merlin where the meetings were held.

And the room was full of druids – and no Merlin.

Freya would have ducked back out the moment she got in, except that every eye was fastened on the door the moment she opened it. "Ah, Lord Emrys –" someone had even started saying, before they all realized it wasn't him.

Obviously they were waiting for Merlin to come back with something. Mortified, afraid, and furious all at once, Freya moved to duck back around the door, muttering a defiant "Sorry" under her breath.

But one nosy leader said suddenly, "You're Merlin's wife, aren't you? They all say you're a druid too. Why don't you come in?"

Freya turned back, clenching her hands by her sides. She recognized some of the leaders from watching some prior councils in the lake, and a few had the courtesy to look away. But most were staring at her with obvious curiosity, and the fury suddenly won out.

They had thrown her out and slunk away in fear from her before, and now they wanted to gawk at her?

"Yes, I'm Merlin's wife," Freya said. She flung up her head, she clenched her hands, and she marched forward to stand before the druids. "And I am a druid. And before I died, you cast me out."

There was instantly a babel of voices; Freya slashed her hand impatiently sideways, and they all mercifully fell quiet.

"Not you personally," she said; Ruadan had been dead for years, and she had seen that from the lake. "His name was Ruadan. But you promised that you would take in all who needed the help – that was the promise of the druids. I sought to find you for years, because you were my last hope. And when I found a camp, I was thrown out."

The muttering had taken on a distinctly uncomfortable tone now. Freya caught the words, "Perhaps he had a reason," whispered to a neighbor.

She had always been good at overhearing conversations.

"Of course he had a reason!" she burst out, betrayed and terrified and furious. "I'd been cursed to be a Bastet – and if I still was, I'd want to kill every one of you here the next time I changed. But he didn't try to find any way to keep me safe – and there would have been ways. He threw me out, and every druid cringed at my presence after that."

Freya could see in their eyes that they remembered. They were all old enough to have been around when she was a girl, and clearly they had heard the rumors. Many cast down their eyes and couldn't look at her. Freya felt a vindictive satisfaction in that.

"You didn't take me in," she said fiercely, eyes burning. "All you saw was the monster, and you drove me out and condemned me to die alone."

"You didn't die alone," a leader with a long beard spoke up, sanctimonious. Apparently he had learned the story of how she had become the Lady of the Lake.

But Iseldir, whom she recognized from the lake, stood up suddenly and came to stand in front of her. "My child," he said gently, "I am sorry that you never came across my group. I vow I would have taken you in, no matter what, no matter what had happened to you. I beg your forgiveness for what my people have done to you."

Freya whirled on him, a cutting comment on her lips – until she met his eyes. He did her the courtesy of not using mind-speak, but his eyes were gentle and determined and truthful.

Merlin came into the room at that moment with a book tucked under his arm that he instantly set down; Freya had been so distracted that she hadn't noticed his coming. His eyes flicked quickly between Freya, the glowering druids, and Iseldir, watching her with pity in his eyes, and he apparently read the room at once, for he came quickly to her side.

"Don't you dare upset my wife," he ordered, and there were shades of Emrys in his command.

But the tears in Freya's eyes weren't angry or afraid now. She flung herself into Merlin's arms, because she really needed a hug just then and he was the only one in the room she trusted to give it.

"It's okay," she whispered to him. "I'm alright."

But she clung to him tightly, drawing support from his arms wrapped close and comforting around her. She could never get over how wonderful and supporting hugs felt from the one man she utterly trusted.

"Excuse me a moment," Merlin told the druids coldly, and stepped back to run his hands along Freya's arms.

"Come on," he whispered to her, linking his fingers with hers.

But Freya turned to meet Iseldir's eyes. "I forgive you," she breathed.

And then she followed Merlin from the room, and burrowed into his arms again the moment the door was shut.

"Iseldir – Iseldir said he would have taken me in, even when I was a Bastet," she whispered, shaking and happy and sad all at once and needing Merlin's support more than ever. "Even when I was a monster. You're the only other one who's ever told me that."

"Freya, you weren't a monster," Merlin told her, as he always did. They both took their turns telling each other this, and maybe one day they'd both believe it. "The Bastet could have been contained if it wasn't constantly antagonized. It didn't attack me, remember?"

"But you're you," Freya said around a choked laugh, curling her fingers into Merlin's fancy court jacket.

He pulled her even closer in response. "I wish you could have met Iseldir back then," he whispered – infuriatingly sincere.

Freya pulled back enough to look him in the eyes. "And change what we had – what we have?" she demanded incredulously. "Change meeting you? Being able to bring Arthur and the others back? Don't you dare, Merlin. Don't you _dare."_

"It might have been better for you," he protested half-heartedly.

Freya shoved him lightly in the chest before tucking herself against him again and clinging. "I don't want to change the past," she protested. "I just – it's nice to know that not all the druids turned their backs on me. That there would have been someone else who would have been willing to give me a home."

"Someone less crazy," Merlin agreed, folding her in his arms again.

"Merlin," Freya protested for the thousandth time, "you are not and never have been a monster." And maybe someday they'd both believe it. "It's just – it's nice to know, you know?"

"Of course I know," he said, contrite, resting his head on hers. "I had Gaius and Mother to support me."

"I wanted to be with you all those years," Freya whispered, to the secret security of his blue jacket. "That was the hardest part of being the Lady – being able to watch you and never, never to touch you and let you know that you were not alone."

"Not never," he whispered back, though she could feel how deeply he was touched. "And you're here now, and I'm with you, and we'll never be alone again."

"Never alone again," Freya whispered, with a little shiver of delight.

Merlin took the rest of the afternoon off from the druids and spent it with Freya. Part of it was that when there were moments like this that reminded them that they had each other now, they tended to want to spend the rest of the day in each other's company, proving it.

A little bit of it, though, Freya suspected, was her husband being a bit vindictive to the druids by making them wait.

She didn't protest.

Iseldir found her a few days later, up on the battlements. The druids were about to leave Camelot, which in spite of everything Freya was glad about, but she didn't mind being found by Iseldir. There was a little piece of her that wished Merlin could be there, as usual, but she was getting better about learning to face people on her own, so she tugged her shawl tighter around her shoulders and turned to meet him with a nod. She had no idea what the correct address would be, and unlike the other day in the council chamber it did matter this time.

Iseldir, however, seemed completely at ease. "My lady," he said calmly, coming to stand by her. "I do not mean to distress you. I simply wished to let you know that you are welcome in my encampments, should you ever choose to visit."

Freya drew in a sharp breath; she hadn't expected that. "I'm sorry, my lord," she faltered, "but my place is here now."

"Goodness, child, I did not mean it as a demand," Iseldir told her, his voice authoritative yet still gentle somehow. "I can see you have a place here. You have woven your way irrevocably into more lives than you know, and there are many who love you and would miss you if you left. I merely meant to make it plain to you that you have the option and a standing invitation. You will never be left out in the cold again."

Freya wrapped her arms around herself, knowing she was trembling slightly, and turned away, not wanting him to see the tears. He had touched the deepest fear she still felt and given her a golden answer. It wasn't that she was afraid of Merlin turning her out – she trusted him, always and forever – but there was no absolute guarantee of his life, and she was no longer Lady of the Lake to catch his soul and send him back if he ever slipped. And if – heaven forbid – if he died, Freya didn't know if she had a home in Camelot.

That wasn't quite true; she knew that as long as Arthur and Gwen and the Knights of the Round Table lived in Camelot, she had a home there. But Freya had known before complete and utter loss, when all the people you had loved and trusted and assumed you would spend your life with were torn away in one fell swoop. She knew better than to assume that even with more people than she had ever thought she would be able to trust in Camelot, her home was never completely secure.

Knowing she had a home with the people she had been born of, the people who had rejected her when she turned dangerous, that her first dream of a home had not been so terribly erroneous after all – that meant more than she wanted Iseldir to know.

"Thank you, my lord," she choked out.

He nodded, calm as always. "Of course," he said. "I will never cast out anyone in need."

After a moment, he asked her, "Who were your parents?"

Freya wondered at his line of questioning, but she told him. "Godfrith and Aslief."

"I should have seen it," Iseldir said at once. "I knew Godfrith your father well, and Aslief your mother just a little. You inherited her beauty and his courage."

Freya rather doubted the latter, but at the moment that was the last of her concerns. She turned to him with wide eyes.

"You knew my parents?" she demanded. "Tell me about them!"

It had been so long, so very long since the names meant anything to anyone but her.

"They were some of the best druids I knew," he said, smiling his quiet smile. "They left our band and settle down when Edwin was born, because they believed they had found a safe place and they didn't want a traveler's life for their children."

He turned and looked away over the town. "Aslief was of the families of the Norse from the North, and some said your father only sought a bride among them because he could find no bride among his own people. But there was no truth in that. She saved his life when he was out hunting one day, and he sought her family out after. There was true love between them."

"I know that," Freya whispered. She had known very little of her parents' heritage, so that what he said was new and fascinating, but from all the happy memories she had of her childhood, she had never doubted that they loved each other.

Iseldur looked at her. "As a matter of fact, I remember you," he said. "I should have remembered you sooner, but it has been so long since I came to your parents' farm and saw you as a young girl. Pardon me?"

Dim memories floated back to Freya, of childhood visitors in long cloaks that her parents had identified as old friends. She wondered if she remembered Iseldur's face from long ago.

"Of course," she said.

By the time Merlin came to find her, Freya had somehow slipped into an animated and easy conversation with Iseldir about her parents. Merlin stopped short when he saw them talking so easily before he smiled and came to Freya's side.

Iseldir smiled when he saw the two of them. "I see I am no longer wanted here," he said. "Ah, young love."

"With all due respect, we're not particularly young," Merlin said ruefully.

"To me you are," Iseldir said with a conspiratorial smile. "I will take my leave of you, Lord Emrys. My lady, I hope we meet again someday."

He put a hand on Freya's shoulder before he left, and she let him.

"He's a good man," Merlin said, putting his arm around Freya's waist.

"He offered to let me stay with his group whenever I want," Freya whispered. "Merlin – Merlin, I'll never be out in the cold again."

"Of course you won't," Merlin said, and pulled her closer to him.

That night, the last night the druids were to be in Camelot, everyone who could come gathered in the courtyard of the castle – royalty and lords and knights and townspeople and druids alike, all mingling together in the square. In the middle of the courtyard was a pyre of wood.

Merlin drew up short when he and Freya came toward the courtyard at dusk and drew in his breath. Freya, who had expected to be more afraid than he was and was clinging to his arm so tightly that she could feel his muscles tense slightly, followed his gaze to the pyre and caught her own breath.

Except for the fact that it was missing the stake in the middle, it looked so much like a pyre to burn a sorcerer on.

Freya had been lucky enough never to witness an execution in Camelot, but she knew Merlin had been deathly afraid of this end for years. So had she, but she had never lived under the direct shadow of the pyre.

"Merlin," she whispered, "it's alright, it's safe. No one will touch you now. Arthur and Gwen wouldn't let them." She hoped the names would remind him that Uther no longer held power.

Merlin drew a deep breath and came back to himself. "Thanks, Freya," he whispered.

"We don't have to go," Freya murmured, her eyes darting among the crowd. There were so many there, so many she couldn't trust at all, and being in the middle of the throng still felt like a terribly unsafe place to be. And she still didn't like bein around this many druids.

Merlin turned to look at her quickly. "We don't," he agreed. "Not if you don't want to."

But she could tell by the determined glint in his eye that he wanted to, if only to shake off the fear of pyres like this in future, and she was never going to leave him alone. She knew he wouldn't leave her alone, either.

"No," she whispered, and wound her arms just a shade tighter around his. "Let's go."

Merlin put his hand over hers, a wordless gesture of pride in her determination to break her own fears, and slipped out into the courtyard with her.

They stayed at the edges, which helped more than Freya wanted to admit. Night had fallen completely now, and a druid lit the pyre with nothing more than a flash of his eyes.

Everyone shifted and chattered, waiting for the evening's entertainment to begin, as the fire climbed through the pyre, faster than it ever should have, aided by flashing eyes. When it had reached the top and smoke and sparks were reaching out toward the heavens, ten bards from the different druid camps stepped forward and began to tell stories.

They wove the tales of fair maidens and noble knights, of good warlocks and sorcerers and dragons, of evil and twisted creatures, and of the good always, always winning in the end. And what they told, they illustrated, in the flames and in the sparks and in the smoke, dancing over the heads of all the people.

Freya found herself drifting closer somehow, drawn into the stories and the illustrations. They were straight out of her childhood; some of the stories she even remembered from the olden days of long ago, and the illustration was the same, even if it was on a grander scale, driven by more bards. The old memories came back, untinged by pain, and Freya forgot her fear in her desire to be nearer the source. Merlin came by her side, unresisting, his own eyes fixed on the beauty over their heads. Freya thought he looked almost wistful when she could spare him a glance.

The old home and the new, Freya thought. In her old home, the home of her childhood, she had had safety and security, and the druids had dropped by every so often to illuminate it with stories. Her new home was Camelot, here with Merlin and the others she trusted and was learning to trust, and the druids would still drop by sometimes and illuminate it with stories. At that moment Freya was absolutely certain that she would always be safe and at home in Camelot.

When she thought about it later she wasn't entirely sure if that was because she was imparting the feelings of safety and total security she had had in her childhood watching the bards create their tales to this evening, or if it had been one of the flashes of true foresight that were rarer and rarer nowadays.

Somehow she thought it might have been the latter.

And somehow in that moment she forgave the druids forever.

The bards came to the end of their tale and bowed to the raucous applause; then one of them turned and saw Merlin. Somehow he and Freya had drifted right to the front of the crowd.

"Ah, Lord Emrys!" the bard said, sweeping a deep bow. "Do you not desire to take your turn?"

Merlin froze. "I – I've never done it before," he admitted. "I don't know if I know any stories."

And then Freya found herself doing something utterly and completely unexpected. "I do," she said.

Merlin turned to look at her, eyes wide, and Freya found it incredible, too, that she'd be willing to do anything in front of a crowd this large. But the strange night, the memories of the old, the fire that was taking away fear forever, made her want to be daring.

"Are you sure?" he whispered.

"I'm sure," Freya whispered back.

Merlin drew a deep breath and nodded. By this time the crowd was chanting, "Court Sorcerer! Court Sorcerer!" Freya caught a glimpse of Arthur, dressed in less finery than usual, standing in the front of the crowd and chanting louder than anyone else.

Merlin saw him too and rolled his eyes, but he bowed in Arthur's direction. "Alright, alright!" he shouted above the cries. "We'll oblige."

The noise instantly fell to a murmuring silence. The bards dropped back from the fire.

Freya, suddenly nervous in the stillness, stepped forward into the space around the pyre by Merlin's side. He cast her a quick glance, reaching for her mind in the stillness; she sent him the idea that she needed a moment.

He nodded, his mind feeling relieved, and looked up at the fire for a long moment. Then the sparks suddenly gathered themselves and grouped into a dragon – the dragon of the Pendragon crest. Merlin turned to look at Arthur as he made it; Arthur met Merlin's eyes and acknowledged the dragon with a small smile and a little nod.

Merlin let the dragon go; then he reached up above and gathered the smoke into the shape of a dancing horse. A fine stallion reared up, and there was a smattering of clapping. Dimly through the mind-connection they still held, Freya felt an old, old fear loosen from Merlin and let go, and he smiled to himself. This time it was Gaius he looked at for a moment.

And then he turned to Freya. "Well then, my lady," he said. "What shall it be?"

Freya remembered a song – an old song her mother had used to sing as a lullaby, a song the bards of her youth had illustrated in the fires. She kept the connection to Merlin so he would know what was coming and be able to illustrate it in the fire, and she gave her mother's song to the people there.

Isildur remembered her parents, and she remembered her parents, and they two were the only ones left. But perhaps if Freya gave everyone the song her mother sang, perhaps they would remember it and, all unknowing, carry a piece of her mother forward. Perhaps the memories of old druid bards who had once sung and were all too likely dead and forgotten by now would not be forgotten completely.

So Freya sang, and Merlin made the shapes. Working in perfect harmony, they gave their gifts unafraid.

The applause was deafening when they finished and bowed themselves out, but it was not for the applause. It had never been for the applause.

After that night, Merlin never flinched from wood in the courtyard again. After that night, Freya started helping Merlin deal with the druids.

When their child Aldyth was born, Freya sang the lullaby for her and Merlin made the shapes in the fire in their own little room, and the memories lived on. And they were home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for not getting this up yesterday; last week was a crazy week, since I was finishing up summer courses, and I didn't get any writing done. Just as a forewarning, my life is about to get crazier, since I have about two weeks before college starts again and a lot going on during them. I'll try to keep posting, but it may not be possible to keep a schedule. I am determined to finish this story now rather than at Christmas, though, so you'll be getting updates sometime in the upcoming weeks. They may just be smaller updates like "Friendless" was broken into, and they may be irregular. We'll see.
> 
> On another note, a lovely reviewer, Ranjit Ponakala, suggested that Freya could have been from Daneclaw. Luckily one of the courses I took this summer was a history course, so I knew what that was! It was a settlement of Vikings in England, covering almost all of the land except for Wales. If I had thought of this idea before I started writing, I might have tried incorporating it (although the sketchy history of the show makes that a bit difficult), but I did decide to have Freya's mother be Norse, which would explain Freya's own name being of Norse origin. I'm pretty sure there were Viking settlements in England even before Daneclaw came to be.
> 
> Also the idea of writing this chapter at all came from the lovely LaughtersMelody, who suggested that Freya's interactions with the druids would be interesting to explore. They certainly were!
> 
> Since this note is getting ridiculously long, I'll close off by saying that the next chapter will be "Loverless," and hopefully at least a first update of it will come next Monday!


	6. Loverless: Merlin

"Mama?"

Freya was sitting on the counter, swinging her legs and plaiting her hair. Her mother was moving deftly around her, getting the bread ready to bake. Her stomach was swelling with the promise of a younger sibling for Freya, but Mama said it would still be months before the baby came. Freya couldn't wait. When she finally had someone younger than her in the family, Edwin wouldn't be able to tease her quite as much.

Her mother paused in her movements for a moment, pushing a strand of hair out of her face with the back of one floury hand. "Yes, darling?"

"I want to be just like you when I grow up," Freya said definitively.

Mama's smile spread across her face, the one that always made Freya feel cozy and warm. "You do, do you?" she said.

"Of course I do," Freya chirped. "I'll live on a farm with a few cows and some mountains and a lake around and have a few kids, and we'll all pick wildflowers in the spring and eat strawberries together. Oh, and I'll be married to the most wonderful man on earth," she added quickly. She'd heard Mama call Papa that plenty of times.

Her mother went back to kneading the dough, but she was still smiling.

"I hope you get to have that life, Freya," she said gently. "I really do."

"Mama?"

Freya ducked into the kitchen, feeling oddly shy. It was baking day, and her mother was covered in flour as usual. Freya slipped up alongside her and took over kneading the dough.

"Thanks, darling," her mother said cheerfully, taking a step back and running one floury hand across her forehead, leaving a streak of white behind. "That does make one tired, after a while. What's on your mind?"

Freya concentrated on kneading the dough and tried not to blush. "Mama," she said shyly, "when did you know you were going to marry Papa?"

She knew the story of how her parents had met well enough; her father had lost his way hunting in the winter and had stumbled across her mother's people. Her mother, who had been training to be a healer, had nursed him through the sickness that had followed, and loved him enough that by the time the spring came she was willing to leave her people to marry him. It was a very romantic story and a familiar one to Freya, but she couldn't remember her mother including this important detail before.

Mama smiled, a very private smile to herself.

"It was one night in the middle of the winter," she said. "Your father was asleep in the makeshift bed of furs we made for him in front of the fireplace in my family's house. I couldn't sleep for thinking of him, so I got up in the middle of the night to creep into the kitchen for some water. He stirred as I was creeping past, though, and looked up at me. 'Aslief,' he said, and smiled in the way he had just for me. And then he fell back asleep. And in that moment I knew."

Freya couldn't help smiling at her mother's story, though it didn't answer all of her questions. She turned and turned the dough, thinking. Her mother pulled down a bit more flour to sift over the dough, but she didn't hurry Freya's thoughts.

"You were already in love with Papa by then, though, weren't you?" Freya asked at last.

"Mm-hm," her mother answered contentedly. "Freya, darling," she went on a moment later, before Freya could ask her when she'd known she was in love, "is there something happening I should know about?"

Freya blushed beet red this time; she couldn't help it.

"Terrel smiled at me when I went into the village today," she whispered.

Her mother straightened a bit, her eyes narrowing on Freya.

"He's the butcher's son, isn't he?" she said. "The one you had a crush on?"

Freya could feel her blush becoming even deeper. She doubted she could answer aloud and didn't really want to.

Mama relaxed back against the counter, her smile growing a bit deeper.

"You have time, you know, Freya," she said gently. "You're just a girl yet. But I do hope someday you will find a man that you know you will marry just by the way he says your name and the way he smiles at you."

Freya looked up at her mother; then she couldn't help it and reached out for a hug. Her mother folded her close instantly and held her there. They would both be covered in flour after this, but Freya didn't mind.

"Do you think it might be Terrel?" she dared to ask, shyly, her voice muffled in her mother's apron.

She felt, more than heard, her mother chuckling softly. "It might be, darling," she said. "Of course it might be."

Freya's mother and her beloved husband died within a month of that conversation.

Freya completely forgot about Terrel in the aftermath.

The tavern in this town was quiet and small, and the owner was actually kind to Freya. It was a cold night, coming on winter, and when she turned up on his doorstep begging for work to do in exchange for food, he took her back into the kitchen and gave her a hot meal free of charge. Freya rarely met with such generosity, and she wasn't too proud by this time to take advantage of it.

The owner and his wife were working in the kitchen as Freya huddled at their kitchen table to eat, warming her cold hands on the hot mug they gave her. They were mostly absorbed in their work, but occasionally one of them would shoot a sidelong glance at her. It put Freya on edge a bit, but not enough to try leaving.

"Do you travel alone?" the wife asked, when Freya got near the bottom of her bowl and was no longer bolting the food down.

"Yes'm," Freya murmured quietly, eyes locked on her bowl.

Husband and wife exchanged a rather long look.

"You know it's not particularly safe out there, dear," the wife said hesitantly.

Freya caught her breath without even meaning to. It had been so, so long since someone had casually used terms of endearment for her, and it took her straight back to her mother's kitchen for a moment.

"I know, ma'am," she said, when she could speak. She most certainly knew. If nothing else, the manner in which she had gotten the wild creature that took over her on some nights would have confirmed it.

"I'm surprised you haven't married, a pretty lass like you," the husband commented.

If he had been any younger, or unmarried, Freya would have tensed and fled immediately. But he was an older man with a grizzled beard and had casually kissed his wife when he brought Freya into the kitchen as though it was something he did half a dozen times a day, so she wasn't particularly afraid of him. She breathed a short, bitter laugh instead.

"I can't marry," she said.

It was the first time she'd thought of it in years, honestly. Little moments like crushes and blushing because a nice boy looked at you were something that belonged to the Freya who had lived safe under the mountains, the Freya who was long gone. Freya's first thought around a man nowadays was instinctive fear. Beyond that, she carried two impossible secrets that she could never reveal to any man, her magic and the Bastet, either of which would be enough to make any man turn her in to be killed.

Well, perhaps a druid wouldn't kill her for the magic, but the druids had turned her away for the Bastet. Everyone would be afraid of her if she shared her secrets. She was alone and she would always be alone. The dreams of the little Freya who had wanted to be married and have a home and children had crumbled into ashes with the rest of that girl.

When she looked up, the tavern owner and his wife were watching her with sympathy in their eyes. The husband turned away when Freya looked at him, but his wife came over and put her arm around Freya's shoulders.

"Oh, honey," she said, "you can't always be alone."

_But I will be,_ Freya thought. For the moment, though, she was content to lean into the gentle arm around her and feel her stomach full for once and her fingers and toes warm. That was enough for now.

The tunnels felt like the safest place Freya had known in years, and part of that security, strangely enough, was knowing that Merlin would be coming back. There was a piece of Freya that never wanted to leave the tunnels, that wanted to stay there, safe and hidden and warm, and get occasional visits from Merlin. It would be a much better life than the life she had known for years.

But the Bastet had taken her over the night before, and Freya was trying with all her might not to think about what she was pretty sure it had done. Letting loose the Bastet, carrying all the anger and grief and fear Freya tried to suppress, in the middle of a town was a terrible idea. She tried even more not to think about the two young lovers the Bastet had seen in the street and been enraged by, nor why it had been enraged. There was a deep longing, even in the Bastet, to be loved, to be cherished and held close. And Freya tried even more not to think why Merlin came into her mind when she thought about that longing. She was alone, she would always be alone, and that was the way it should be.

She curled herself up against the wall, Merlin's jacket over her lap, clinging to the torn shoulders of her dress, and thought about home instead. Spring . . . wildflowers . . . the strawberries she and Edwin had picked, Aldyth trailing at their heels . . .

Firelight flashed over her suddenly, but she knew the footsteps, knew it was Merlin, and didn't move. Somehow he was safe. She didn't want him to know about the Bastet, or he would never feel safe with her again.

"I know," he said, as he came around the corner to her little alcove and set down his flaming torch, "I'm late. Again. Sorry. But this," he said dramatically, turning around and displaying a whole round loaf of bread, "is going to be the best bread you have ever tasted."

Freya didn't stir, though she wondered how he had smuggled a loaf that large down into the tunnels. It was so hard, even, to feel safe with him and know that if he saw her as a Bastet he would be unsafe with her. She wanted to dream, more than she had wanted to in years, and she daren't.

"Come on!" Merlin exclaimed cheerfully. "You can have anything. Ham. Cheese."

It dawned on Freya that he was planning to make something with magic to go along with the bread. "Strawberries," she said shyly.

Merlin looked faintly surprised for a moment; then he nodded. "Strawberries it is," he said. He cleared his throat, rubbed his hands together eagerly and shook them out. He was so openly delighted by the chance of doing magic for her that Freya couldn't help watching him and smiling; she wondered if he often got such a chance to delight in his magic.

Merlin stretched out his arms and clasped his hands together; Freya glanced from his intently focused face to his hands. _"Blostma,"_ he whispered, and his eyes flashed gold.

He uncupped his hands – and a small, perfect red rose lay between them.

Merlin looked rather surprised, and Freya couldn't help smiling. "That's not a strawberry," she teased him, half-laughing.

"It's the right color," Merlin defended himself, grinning. He offered the rose to her, bowing his head like he was a knight presenting a trophy to a queen.

Freya uncurled enough to take it from him, unable to stop smiling. Merlin glanced away from her, his full, wide smile breaking across his face. Her acceptance apparently delighted him.

Freya played with the petals of the rose, feeling suddenly shy. "Why are you so good to me?" she asked him. In her experience, kindness to someone like her was incredibly rare. Kindness like Merlin showed was unheard-of.

Merlin shifted to sit against the wall across from her, looking thoughtful. "Because – I can't help it," he said, slowly, as if he was trying to find the right words. "Because I – I like you," he said with sudden determination, and he looked up at her with bright blue eyes.

Freya didn't really know if he meant that he liked her in general or in any kind of romantic sense, but she knew in that moment that she was just a little bit in love with him. She looked down and smiled.

"With you, I can just be who I am," Merlin went on, and she thought of his open display of delight in making the rose. "We don't have to hide anything. We don't have to worry."

And in that moment Freya knew she couldn't hide the Bastet from him. She had had two secrets for years. He knew the one, that she was a druid, and didn't seem to mind, but he deserved to know the other. And if he left her behind when he knew, so be it.

"Merlin, please, listen to me," she said. He cocked his head and leaned forward, as if he was hanging off her every word. "I'm not like you," she said.

Before she could go on, there was the distant sound of the door to the tunnels crashing open. Merlin spun to look around the corner. "They must have followed me," he said, and scrambled to his feet. Freya followed his example. Merlin snatched up the torch and ground it out, then bent to grab the bread and candles. Freya clung to the little rose. With a quick tilt of his head in her direction, Merlin moved quickly deeper into the tunnels, and Freya followed close on his heels. After a moment she put the rose in the pocket of his jacket, hurried to catch up with him, and wrapped a hand tightly around his arm; she desperately didn't want to be alone. Merlin glanced down at her with kind eyes but didn't say anything.

They found an alcove deeper in the tunnel system; Merlin tossed all the things into the deep shadows of the walls with the exception of one candle and crouched by the wall of the alcove, listening. Freya crouched by his side.

And then she could hear it, the tramp of distant footsteps, multiple sets, but one in particular the all-too-familiar tramp of Halig's boots. She could hear the rattle of the chains he carried over his shoulders. She stifled a gasp and gripped Merlin's arm with both hands, terrified.

She would be found. She would be discovered and thrown back in the cage, powerless, helpless, waiting cold and bitter for the release of death. She wanted to sob desperately, but with an intense effort she kept it in, breathing lightly and letting the tears slip down her cheeks soundlessly. The only thing keeping her grounded was Merlin beside her. He didn't seem to mind the death-grip she had on his arm, so she didn't let go.

Finally the footsteps and the clanking retreated, going back out of the tunnels. Merlin, who had been watching intently around the corner, turned back to her, and they slid down the wall together to huddle on the ground. Freya was sobbing now and gasping for breath; she couldn't help it. Merlin lit the candle he still held with a wave of his hand, but Freya barely noticed.

"They're going to find me," she gasped out.

"Shh," Merlin breathed gently, grasping her trembling hands in his, but she couldn't shush.

"I can't go back in that cage, I can't," she told him desperately, and pressed the back of her hand to her lips to stifle her sobs.

"I won't let that happen," Merlin promised her, low and intent. "I promised you I'd look after you, and I will. No matter what."

His words calmed her. No one had cared about her in so long; no one had promised her that they would care for her. She moved their hands away from her face and drew in long, shuddering breaths.

"You really don't realize how special you are, do you?" Merlin asked quietly.

Freya glanced up at him quickly. No one, no one had ever thought she was special, not since her family.

"You're not scared of me?" she asked him.

And she knew it was unfair to ask, when she hadn't told him everything, but she so desperately wanted someone to not be afraid of her, not to shy away at the mention of that cursed druid girl.

Merlin shook his head a little. "Being different's nothing to be scared of," he told her.

Freya let herself believe him. And Merlin – Merlin was glancing at her lips and moving a little toward her.

Freya knew he would back away if she told him to, that he wouldn't kiss her against her will, and so she wasn't afraid to let him do it. He somehow liked her, and she very much liked him, and she met his lips halfway with her own.

It was her first kiss, tender and quiet and sweet, and all the old dreams came back to her in that instant and she knew she was in love with Merlin.

They broke apart, and Freya looked down shyly and gasped for breath for a moment or two, because she had been crying a minute ago and she still couldn't breathe much. But Merlin rubbed his thumb gently over her fingers, and suddenly everything seemed far more beautiful than it had since she was a small girl.

When Merlin left her, she curled up to sleep under his jacket, the red rose he had given her clutched tenderly to her breast; she forgot about the Bastet, she forgot about her fear, and for the first time in years she dreamed about what it would be like to be married.

It wasn't that Freya wasn't on some level grateful for the odd life she had in the lake; she might still be very alone, but she no longer had to be afraid, since she was the only one there – besides maybe the Sidhe, which she never saw after the first day when their Elder explained matters to her. There was none of the fear that had always lingered with her even when she was on her own during those last few years.

On the other hand, Freya had never wanted to live more than in those last few days before she died. She had loved Merlin and he somehow had loved her too, the bright brief flame of love between them burning bright. She wouldn't have killed him as the Bastet, and he somehow hadn't been afraid of her that way either. They could have made it – they could have run away together and lived safely in a little cottage by the lakeside. And they would both have been happy.

Freya wished she could have lived for that.

She was safe in the lake, but she was lonely too, her bright dream ripped away from her the moment it had had a chance to properly come back to life.

There was a small measure of consolation in watching the images of Camelot on the surface of her lake, and it was both comforting and difficult to watch Merlin grieve her. Comforting, because there was one person who had mourned her death, and she wasn't utterly forgotten; difficult, because in watching him grieve she finally truly believed he had loved her, and it made her wish more than ever that she could have lived.

He spent a whole week of nights sitting curled up in his bed, making red roses. Freya watched him every night, not certain what he was doing, as the mound of little red roses like the one he had made her grew beside his bed. Finally, one night, when he uncupped his hands, a perfect little red strawberry lay between them.

Merlin relaxed then, the frantic energy that had filled the other nights gone, and flopped back on his bed, the strawberry clutched close to him. He closed his eyes, tears leaking quietly out from under his closed lashes.

Freya knew then, too, what he had been doing, and she found herself crying too.

The oddest thing about being the Lady of the Lake in a lot of respects was actually being a lake. Freya still had a human form, still thought and felt as a human, but her consciousness was also spread throughout the lake; she knew every rock and weed and fish and the sword that lay at the bottom of it intimately. There was a sense where she was also very much not a corporeal being, spread throughout all the water.

There was a little bit of water that somehow had a higher concentration of _her,_ in a way, than any other bit of water, and that was the water in the little vial the Fisher King still held. Freya became conscious of that bit of water separated from the rest of her, held in that vial, the day she became the Lady of the Lake, but it took her a while of adjusting before she really reached out to investigate it. Then she realized that it was precious to the King, a gift held carefully to protect the future of Albion, whenever it came together.

The Fisher King had a touch of magic, and he was very old and very alone and not really human anymore either, and Freya found that she could communicate with him a little through the vial. Not very much, just enough to know that he was dedicated to remaining until he could give the vial to Emrys in order to help the Once and Future King be able to rule Albion, and enough to give him a bit of company through the last year or so of his life.

Then Merlin came, and Freya trembled, because she could both watch him on the roof of her lake and _feel_ him coming near to the vial that contained a great deal of her. She mourned to lose the Fisher King, because now she had lost the one bit of company that she had, but there was something very contented deep within her at Merlin carrying the vial that contained her. It made her realize that the love that had sprung up within her was perhaps not so dead and gone after all.

When Merlin fled Camelot with the coming of Morgana and Morgause and the undead army Freya had watched them form, he took the vial of water from Avalon with him. And in the quiet night of the cave, he tried to seek its guidance.

Freya poured all of her spirit that she could into the vial and yearned to be able to reach through it and communicate with Merlin, but even she wasn't sure how he was to release her so that she could tell him what he needed to know about the sword she kept safe for him. None of his spells could release her from the glass vial. At last he fell asleep, with the vial tucked against his heart, and Freya wondered if it was odd that she felt comforted, somehow, by that.

He startled awake when Gwaine stirred and dropped the vial; the glass broke and the water Freya filled began to drip over the stones. "Oh no," Merlin breathed, terrified, but Freya felt elated. She could feel herself slipping out of the water with every drop that flowed over the floor, her essence leaving it, and knew her time was short, but this, this she was sure was the way she could communicate with Merlin.

As the water puddled in a cleft in the rock, Freya was there – and she could look up through it and see Merlin, see him properly and not in the wavery shadows on the shore of her lake. It was almost overwhelming for a moment, getting this chance to see the man she still loved again.

Merlin looked stunned, clearly not having expected it to be her who gave him direction through the vial at all. "Freya," he breathed, choking a bit on her name.

Their time was short, and there was a lot she needed to say, but Freya couldn't get on to it at once. "I've missed you," she said, smiling, the truth coming from her lips almost involuntarily.

Merlin stared at her as though he couldn't believe it at all. "You – " he began and couldn't go on.

It dawned on Freya that Merlin hadn't even known she had become the Lady of the Lake; he would have thought her dead and gone. She wanted to have time for a proper reunion, to explain everything to him, but there was no time. "Merlin, we don't have long," she warned him.

He ignored that anyway. "Is it really you?" he said, between a question and a statement, smiling a little bit.

It warmed Freya to the depths of her soul, even if she could never say it, that even in a time of great need for Camelot, even when he was looking to the vial to show him a way, his first thought was for her.

She explained as best she could. "I swore that one day I would repay you," she said. "Now is the moment."

"I don't understand," Merlin said, looking as confused as ever.

Freya got down to business. "There is but one weapon that can slay something which is already dead," she reminded him.

"A blade forged in the dragon's breath," Merlin answered, catching on instantly.

"That weapon lies at the bottom of the Lake of Avalon, where you hid it," Freya reminded him.

"But Morgana's army are not dead," Merlin protested. "They're very much alive."

It would seem that way to him, Freya realized, with the army being unable to be killed. This was the moment when all the things that she saw on the roof of her lake and the realization she had had through her magic about Morgana's army came very much in handy. "Whoever toys with the cup pays a terrible price," she told Merlin. "The moment they entered their pact with Morgause, they became the living dead. You must come to the lake."

"And you will give me the sword," Merlin said, looking as if the outline of the plan was dawning on him.

"In your hands it has the power to save Albion," Freya told him, and knew it for the truth.

"Thank you," Merlin said, and he smiled a little, and Freya couldn't keep herself from smiling in return.

"No," she protested softly. "It's given me the chance to see you again."

And this chance, the chance to see him properly, to actually talk with him instead of simply watching him from a distance, meant more to her than even she had thought it would.

"That's better," Gwaine grunted in the background, and Merlin turned to face him. "You alright?" Gwaine asked. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Freya's time was running out; she could no longer make her face appear in the little pool of water as her essence leaked away from the vial's water. She was seeing things through an odd mix of the vision from the vial and her usual vision on the roof of the lake.

"I'm alright," Merlin answered, and though there was a catch in his voice he smiled the wide smile Freya had come to love so much. "Really."

He turned back toward her puddle. "Freya?" he whispered.

She still loved so much how he said her name.

But the last drop of water ran down the stone and into the puddle, and with it she could stay in the puddle no longer. She was gone from it, and the water was nothing more than ordinary water, and she could only watch Merlin on the roof of her lake and wait for him to come get the sword.

He came to get it as soon as he could call the dragon to fly him to the lake, and propelled himself out onto Freya's waters in a little boat. Freya was waiting for him, floating near the surface of the lake, with the sword she had promised him clutched across her lap. When Merlin was a fair distance from the shore, she broke the water and held up the sword. And Merlin smiled.

Freya couldn't come any further out of the water than she needed to, unable to come up properly and talk to Merlin, which was a bitter disappointment. But Merlin's hand touched hers as he took the dragon-forged sword, and he curled his hand over hers for a moment after he had taken the sword. Just for a moment, Freya tangled her fingers with his, and the sweet magic of those days stolen in the tunnels swept over her.

When he was gone, Freya sank back to the bottom of the lake to watch what happened next on the roof of her lake, but she was thinking hard too. She had thought that her death had ripped away her dreams of love forever, but she still loved Merlin. He still loved her. She was still here, so her promise to repay him was not yet completely fulfilled. They were tangled up by myths and magic and love.

Freya didn't know what all that meant, had no idea if it meant that anything more than this yearning from a distance could come of the sweet flame that had sprung up between her and Merlin. But for now, for now she would not give up on hope.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So clearly this is coming out much later than I intended it to; I forgot how hard it is to write anything during a semester at college! But here it is at long last for an early Christmas present. I decided to split this chapter into three parts to make it a bit easier for me to write, so the other two parts should be showing up before too long. Given how near we are to Christmas, I can't give a definite date when they'll be out, but I will most definitely be finishing this story before I go back to school in mid-January. Thank you so much for your patience, and I hope you liked this next bit of Freya's story!

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't my view of what the afterlife is like at all, but it's the fictional afterlife I'm giving Freya for this story. :) 
> 
> The ideas of Merlin being Camelot's unofficial Spymaster and the servants unofficial spies are from the wonderful Drag0nst0rm, who gave me permission to borrow those ideas. And the little bit describing Lancelot's chivalry as "truth and honor, freedom and courtesy" is from _Canterbury Tales_ by Chaucer. I had to read some of it for a literature class right about the time I was writing that bit of this story. 
> 
> I'm excited to finally be writing about Freya; I love her character, and I've had ideas rattling around in my head for her since I started writing for Merlin again this summer. Since I've finally posted everything I have written about Merlin to this site, this story will now go on my regular posting schedule of being updated on Mondays. Next chapter: "Friendless."


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